The Japanese have been using oiled paper as a building material for hundreds of years; many traditional Japanese structures have oiled paper in place of windows. Here is a 21st Century update.
By using one of the several fields generated when current flows through a wire, a piece of paper or cardboard or plastic screening or cloth can be made into something very strong. This “field” can be generated to be up to an inch thick as a solid building material. This material is far stronger than drywall or plywood, but must be “powered” by a continuous supply of direct current.
Ok. You wouldn’t want to make your home of this material, but what about a tent. What about setting up the tent and generating the field so that it had a very hard structural integrity; capable of preventing ripping from a bear attack or being penetrated by a bullet.
Actually, this “field” that I am talking about resists impacts and as the projectile penetrates, the field resists it exponentially. This applies to bullets and bombs and shaped charge jets of molten copper. Using this field, uniforms that soldiers wear can be turned into impenetrable body armor, even against large caliber bullets or cannon shot. This will even prevent a depleted uranium dart sabot round from penetrating; all of the kinetic energy is absorbed and pushed-back on the penetrator.
Using this “field” and light-weight plastic screening, a very light-weight tank or armored personnel carrier could be developed; generator-fed redundant batteries would keep the fields going. There is no reason that the barrel of a cannon could not be made from this material; it is actually far stronger than the strongest steel.
Obviously, I see the military potential of this material, but it can also be used to make very strong, light-weight cars, trucks, planes, trains and boats/ships with protected, redundant sources of direct current electricity.
This field-generated material can be opaque, translucent or transparent depending on the material being used to generate the field. Very thin clear plastic sheets can be used to create transparent fields of view.