A slender filament such as a hair from your head or a blade of grass, easily buckles into a folded shape, but when you let it go, it springs back into its original shape. This image, taken by graduate student Gangaprasath and postdoc Joel Marthelot In the Menon lab, shows a soft slender filament made of silicone rubber, floating on a liquid surface to slow down the process of straightening out.