text: When we stretch a piece of rubber, e.g. a rubber band, we notice that it deforms uniformly, lengthwise. Every element along its length experiences the same extension factor as the entire sample. If we release one end, the sample snaps back to its original length very rapidly, too fast for our eye to resolve the process. Our intuitive expectation is that it returns to its original length in the same manner as when it was stretched, i. e. uniformly. However, this is not what happens. Experimental observations by Mrowca et al. show a surprising behavior. To capture the extremely fast retraction dynamics, they utilized a clever experimental method devised by Exner and Stefan in 1874, well before high-speed electronic measuring devices were invented. Their method consisted of a rapidly rotating glass cylinder which, after being coated with lamp black, was placed next to the stretched rubber sample. Styli, attached to the mid-point and free end of the rubber sample, were held in contact with the glass cylinder. Then, as the free end of the rubber snapped back, the styli traced out helical paths in the lamp black coating of the rotating cylinder. By adjusting the rotation speed of the cylinder, they could record the position of the styli in less than one complete rotation. The trajectories were transferred to a graph by rolling the cylinder on a piece of damp blotter paper. The mark left by a stylus appeared as a white line (no lamp black) on the paper.
  Their data, plotted as the graph in Fig. 5, shows the position of end and midpoint styli as the sample rapidly retracts to its original length. The sample was initially stretched 9.5” beyond its unstrained length and then released. The styli returned to their original positions (displacement of 0”) in a little over 6 ms. The linear behavior of the displacement vs. time indicates that, after a brief acceleration, both the end and the midpoint of the sample snapped back at a constant velocity of about 50 m/s or 112 mph.  However, the midpoint stylus did not start to move until about 3 ms after the end was released.  Evidently, the retraction process travels as a wave, starting at the free end.
  At high extensions some of the energy stored in the stretched network chain is due to a change in its entropy, but most of the energy is stored in bond distortions (regime II, above) which do not involve an entropy change. If one assumes that all of the stored energy is converted to kinetic energy, the retraction velocity may be calculated directly from the familiar conservation equation E =  mv. Numerical simulations, based on the Molecular Kink paradigm, predict velocities consistent with this experiment.