List of fictional super metals

Super or wonder metals are fictional metals which possess unnatural physical properties beyond any that are currently known and are frequently used as plot enabling devices within science fiction and fantasy stories, role playing games, and video games. The properties of such metals usually include some or all of the following:


 * Strength of a superior nature.
 * Hardness in the extreme.
 * Thermal tolerance of fantastic proportions.
 * Elasticity in great measure.
 * Density which is either exceedingly high or low.
 * Restorative functions on persons or living entities.
 * Other unusual chemical, physical, radioactive, nuclear, or supernatural properties.

List of Fictional Super Metals
The following is an alphabetized list of fictional super metals.

Adamantite / Adamantium / Adamantine
Adamantium, adamantite, or adamantine, depending on the source, is a near indestructible super alloy or metal which is referred to in wide variety of sources, including the Marvel Universe, Might and Magic PC game series, Master of Orion and Master of Magic PC games, and role playing games such as Dungeons & Dragons and Warhammer 40,000.

According to the X-Men movies adamantium can be shaped when created (by the combination of fluid ingredients). However, once cooled to a solid state, it becomes indestructible once again. Through Magneto's effects on Wolverine's adamantium skeleton, it can also be established that adamantium is a magnetized alloy. The Forgotten Realms setting of D&D makes frequent reference to this material.

Andrium
Andrium Armor is the fourth strongest type of armor in the Master of Orion series.

Arenak
Arenak and inoson are both transparent, super-hardened treatments of ordinary metals which appear in Edward E. Smith's The Skylark of Space and its sequels, some of the first fiction featuring interstellar travel.

Bendezium
A metal found in Retro Studios' Metroid Prime video game series. It can only be destroyed by the Power Bomb weapon.

Byzanium
A fictional fissile element from Clive Cussler's Raise the Titanic! novel.

Carbonium
An ore composite from the game Fury3, found exclusively on the planet L24-D. Carbonium explodes with 48 times the power and radiation damage of a fusion bomb.

Cargonite
An incredibly dense and supposedly impenetrable metal featured in 4D Man, a 1959 film.

Cortosis
A lightsaber resistant metal used in Star Wars.

Chogokin Z / Super-Alloy Z
This is the metal utilized to construct the eponymous Super Robot of the anime series Mazinger Z. In the series, Chogokin Z is created from the newly-discovered element Japanium. Other variant metals include Chogokin New-Z, used to construct Great Mazinger, and Chogokin New-Zα, which was the basis material for Mazinkaiser. The series' sequel Grendizer features an unrelated but still highly similar metal called Space Alloy Gren.

The term "chogokin" has since become a trademarked name for toys and models manufactured in Japan by Bandai. It is also informally and frequently used by collectors to describe toys with high die-cast metal content, or in a nostalgic sense toward those earlier Super Robot series and toys.

Dalekanium
In the Doctor Who TV show, this is the material from which the Daleks craft their nearly indestructible battle shells. The metal is considered a bonded polycarbide, and was dubbed "dalekanium" by the human Dortmun in The Dalek Invasion of Earth. Later it is seen that the Daleks call the material by this term.

Darksteel
An indestructible metal found on Mirrodin, a plane in the Magic: the Gathering universe.

Duralloy
Duralloy Armor is the sixth strongest type of armor in the Master of Orion series.

Duranium
In Star Trek, spacecraft hulls are made from the super metal alloys duranium and tritanium.

Durasteel
Durasteel is one of the most used alloys in the Star Wars universe. Its qualities include: being very flexible, resistant to heat and cold, monumentally physically stress resistant, and the color brown. Because of these it is the most common material for the manufacture of spacecraft hulls.

Durium
Durium was an ultra-strong, extremely dense, infusable sapphire blue alloy of made from resistium and other "ultra-elements" (which had an atomic structure consisting of a nucleus of "negatrons," orbital protons and without any electrons present in the atom at all), in The Infinite Atom by John W. Campbell, Jr. Durium would also be featured in several of the later works of E.E. "Doc" Smith.

Gundanium
This is a super metal from Mobile Suit Gundam It is immutable, highly heat-resistant, and electrically neutral

H-128
In Irwin Allen's City Beneath the Sea(1971), H-128 was a extremely radioactive metallic isotope which required gold shielding for safe storage.

Herculite
USOS Seaview, the fictional submarine from the motion picture and television show Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, had large observation ports made from "X-tempered herculite," a transparent metal developed by Admiral Harriman Nelson. In Theodore Sturgeon's novelization of the film, Seaview's Captain describes the ports as "... oversized hull plates which happen to be transparent."

Inoson
Arenak and inoson, transparent, super-hardened treatments of ordinary metals which appear in The Skylark of Space and its sequels. Inoson was the theoretically strongest substance in the universe.

Iridium-80
This is a heavy isotope of iridium, with one second of direct exposure equivalent to a lethal dose. (A reading of 3217.89 Rads/hr is recorded from from fifty feet away). The blade of St. Michael's Sword, from Riptide was forged from this material. In real life Iridium 80 is impossible as all known isotopes have over 170 nucleons.

Mandalorian Iron
A metal used by the Mandalorian warriors.

Mithril
This is a super metal from J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth universe. It is precious and silvery, stronger than steel but much lighter in weight. It first appears in The Hobbit, where it is also called "silver-steel". Its properties were developed in The Lord of the Rings.

Necrodermis
In Warhammer 40,000, the Necrons utilize a material called necrodermis (which translates into "Corpse Skin"), a metal that heals itself, for everything, including their own bodies. The "living metal" was used, in particular, to create the slow moving tomb ships which were able to carry the Necrons through space to colonize various foreign worlds. Additionally, necrodermis was capable of being formed into bodies which the C'tan, a formless energy mass, could inhabit.

Neosteel
In StarCraft, neosteel is a super strong metal used to construct Terran Battlecruisers, processed from mineral crystals.

Neutronium
An (incredibly dense, degenerate ionised matter) is featured in many works of science fiction.

Octiron
A dark, dense, magical metal from the Discworld novels. Not only is it rare, but it is also naturally imbued with magical power. In its unrefined state it produces high levels of thaumatic radiation. The great bell of Unseen University, which is constructed of octiron, produces negative sound when struck, and other unforeseen results often accompany octiron's use. The molten core of the Discworld is thought to be composed of Octiron giving rise to the strong magical field of the disc. As seen by how compass needles are constructed with octiron, the metal is highly attracted to such magical fields.

Orichalcum
A reddish metal mentioned in several ancient writings, most notably Plato's Critias dialogue. Orichalcum was considered second only to gold in value, and could be mined in many parts of ancient Atlantis. By the time of Critias, however, it was known only by name. It is used to make structures, walls, and coins, and may perhaps be based on an actual mineral or gold/copper alloy, possibly Auricupride.

In sources of modern media however the metal has acquired much more wonderful qualities. In the Indiana Jones adventure game it is used to power the machinery in Atlantis, while in the Exalted setting orichalcum is the strongest of the five magical materials and can be created by distilling mundane gold using Gaia's blood (Magma) and concentrated sunlight.

It also appears in several video games—occasionally spelled orichalcon—usually as a material better than "ordinary" mithril. In Final Fantasy for the Nintendo Entertainment System the party of heroes comes across orichalcum as a versatile but incredibly powerful sword. Although of fairly high attack power and accuracy it can unexpectedly be used by ninjas, thieves, and black wizards.

Parium
In Marooned by John W. Campbell, Jr., the Jovian exploration ship Mercury was constructed from parium and synthium, elements which had great tensile strength.

Photafine Steel
Seen in the Doctor Who episode, Planet of the Dead, photafine steel is a metal that gets colder the hotter the outside temperature is. It was seen on the Tritovore's space ship.

Phrikk
Within the Star Wars Expanded Universe phrikk is a metal strong enough to withstand the destruction of an entire world.

ProtoZortium
In Ehud Gat's Lilith: Operation Genesis, ProtoZortium was an alloy of metal that was partially grafted unto biological matters (proteins, possibly). The matter was 20 times more resilient than steel and could partially deflect beam weapons (such as lasers). being quasi-alive, dents and holes would regenerate over time. The super-metal was used for armors of ships and the likes but could also be laced into the bones of a human subject to form a bond that turn the bones nearly indestructible.

Radium X
Radium X was an intensively radioactive extraterrestrial element discovered by Dr. Janos Rukh (Boris Karloff) in the 1936 film the The Invisible Ray. In the film, Dr. Rukh creates a death beam projector which harnesses the incredible power of Radium X for use as a destructive weapon of mass terror. Interestingly, Radium X also had healing powers. In a memorable scene, Rukh restores the sight of his blind mother (Violet Kemble Cooper) with the Radium X projector after developing a filter to curb its destructive effects. According to legend, this scene inspired John Lawrence (the younger brother of physicist Ernest Lawrence) to use radiation on his mother--who had been diagnosed with inoperable cancer of the uterus.

Randsdell's Metal
An infusable metal of extreme strength used to insulate nuclear rocket engine nozzles in the novel When Worlds Collide.

Rearden Metal
A new alloy that allowed to build better and more resistant railroads in the novel Atlas Shrugged.

Resistium
The "hydrogen" of the "ultra-elements" (which had an atomic structure consisting of a nucleus of "negatrons," orbital protons and without any electrons present in the atom at all), resistium was many times stronger than steel or titanium and had unique chemical and electromagnetic properties. First featured in The Incredible Planet by John W. Campbell, Jr.

Scrith
In Larry Niven's Ringworld, this metal forms both the walls and floors of the Ringworld. It is milky-gray translucent, and nearly frictionless. A fairly thin layer of scrith is capable of blocking 40% of the neutrinos that encounter it, equivalent to almost a light year of lead. It also absorbs, in near entirety, all other radiation and subatomic particles, and it rapidly dissipates heat. The tensile strength of scrith is similar to the strong nuclear force, with the Ringworld foundation only about 30m deep. Additionally, it is transparent to large magnetic fields.

Enormously strong: scrith is impervious to most weapons, and even such a force as most comets or asteroids. In order to bypass this, Ringworld engineers used a device called the cziltang brone to pass from spaceports, through the scrith, to the Ringworld.

Scrith is said to have been artificially produced through the transmutation of matter.

Sheol
Sheol, also known as red sheol, is a metal in the game Fury3. The isomorphic decay of this mineral attracts wormholes. Sheol is only found in the topsoil of the planet Ares.

Space Alloy Gren
This is the metal utilized to construct the eponymous Grendizer of the anime series Grendizer. The metal seems highly similar to Chogokin Z, another fictional metal used to construct mechs.

Synthium
In Marooned by John W. Campbell, Jr., the Jovian exploration ship Mercury was constructed from parium and synthium, metallic super elements which had great tensile strength.

Thyrium
In the Matthew Reilly novel, Temple, thyrium is an extremely dense extra-terrestrial metal that is native to a binary star system called the Pleides [really an open star cluster, also known as the Seven Sisters, but it does contain a binary star system called HD-23642] and found on Earth only from meteorites. Thyrium bears a striking resembalance to the radioactive terrestrial elements Plutoium and Uranium, but because it is denser it takes fractionally less mass of it to produce the same amount of energy as a larger peice of Uranium. Thyrium also burns with 100% efficiency leaving no contaminated waste byproducts, unlike the Terrestrial element Uranium which creates waste that must be discarded in radioactive rods. A particular isotope thyrium-261 is the core element of a thermonuclear device called a Supernova, which is capable of destroying almost a third of the Earth's mass causing the Earth to spin out of orbit and into space.

Transparent Aluminum
A hardened development of aluminum which was transferred by Montgomery Scott to a 1980's human engineer in the movie Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home in exchange for 6-inch thick perspex sheets to construct a large whale-holding water tank within their stolen Klingon Bird of Prey.

In the scene in which Scotty provided the formula for transparent aluminum on a Mac computer, the diagram showed an alloy of aluminum, silver and oxygen in an approximate chemical formula of Al306Ag2. A real-life development of transparent aluminum is ALON, or aluminum oxynitride, that has an approximate chemical formula of Al23027N5.

Transparisteel
This is a metal with transparency similar to glass and tensile strength similar to that of steel, quite common in the Star Wars universe.

Tritanium
In Star Trek, spacecraft hulls are made from the super metal alloys duranium and tritanium.

Lilith: Operation Genesis defines it as CuAst2Ti3 (or Copper Distroidium TriTitanium), an industrial alloy using a fictional element (Astroidium, allegedly mined in the asteroid belt). Defined as "lustrous silvery", tritanium is completely impervious to all forms of energy currents. Tritanium Armor is also the third strongest type of armor in the Master of Orion series.

Turtleanium
A mysterious and extremely rare metal used in construction of the Turtletron's exoskeleton shielding. Seen in the comic Viva la Lobster.

Unobtanium
The material from which the ship Virgil was constructed in the film The Core. The word unobtanium is also colloquially used by engineers to describe non-existent materials with desirable mechanical properties ("That shaft would have to be made of unobtanium in order to carry such a high load").

Unnamed Metal
A unnamed super dense metal in Battlefield Earth by L. Ron Hubbard that mixed with certain other elements causes an uncontrollable fission process that continues until there is nothing left of a planet except light gases. This metal is suppose to occur in meteorites before they burn up in an atmosphere.

Vibranium
In the Marvel Universe is a metal called vibranium with unusual sonic properties. It is usually associated with the African nation of Wakandia. Vibranium is the prime component of Captain America's Shield.

Wellstone
"Programmable matter" whose properties can be changed to emulate any chemical element, described by Wil McCarthy. Fictional treatments of Wellstone are found in several of his books including The Collapsium, The Wellstone, Lost in Transmission. His non-fiction description of how Wellstone might be created is Hacking Matter.

X
The metal which made space flight possible as a chemical catalyst for total matter-energy conversion reactions in The Skylark of Space by E.E. "Doc" Smith.

Yautjavian metal
The Predator race, called Yautja, of the Predator films, as well as the humanoid aliens from AVP, use a super-light metal that can be forged to a monomolecular edge. Such an edge would be impossible with any nonfictional element, none currently known that provide such a strong molecular bonding. Yautjavian weapons thus work on the principle that the thinner the cutting edge the more keen the weapon, this metal allowing for impossibly sharp blades. Often this metal is layered for greater strength, as when made into Yautjavian plate armor.

Zortium
An extremely hard super metal used to armor starships in the Master of Orion PC games series. According to Master of Orion II: Battle at Antares, it is 4 times as strong as titanium (based on game statistics which quadruples the ship's durability in relation to the standard titanium combat armors.