I refer to rubber bands and other elastic materials.
In: Engineering
At a molecular level a rubber band is made of long polymer chains, this is to say long chains of atoms. These chains can be deformed but like to revert to their original shapes, they also are able to slide past each other.
These properties are what allow for elasticity to occur.
Now if the rubber is treated with heat or chemically, links between the chains are formed which inhibit these sort of movements and the rubber may be more like a solid plastic.
All materials have some level of elasticity, even metals and ceramics, only they deform very little, and if you push them too far they permanently deform or crack.
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