Chinese rocket engine designers have used their expertise to create a new twist on an old idea to help buildings withstand earthquakes.

The basic idea, known as seismic base isolation, is to decouple a building's superstructure from its underlying support structure, so that shock waves from an earthquake are absorbed.

While the basic concept is not new, engineers at the Academy of Aerospace Solid Propulsion Technology in Xi'an, Shaanxi province, found a way to adapt some techniques used in the production of flexible joint nozzles - key parts on rocket engines - to make seismic base isolators that perform better than others of their kind on the market.