Formed deep within the earth, graphene has been proved to be stronger than steel, and thinner than a human hair. Some experts even refer to it as “the most amazing and versatile” material known to man.
China has achieved a major breakthrough in heavy-duty anti-corrosion coating by using modified graphene, according to the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS).
The results were achieved by scientists led by researcher Wang Liping and academician Xue Qunji through years of research and development.
Transparent electronic and electro-optical (EO) devices have become an area of increasing interest in modern day technology research. Graphene’s excellent optical and electronic properties have made it an ideal material for research in such technologies and has become a material of considerable and continuous interest for transparent conductive electrodes in liquid crystal electro-optical devices.
Recent advances in single-molecule thermoelectricity has isolated and identified different families of high-performance molecules. However, to realize the commercial potential of these molecules and convert them into real-world thin-film energy-harvesting devices, fundamental issues surrounding parallel-aligned junctions within these devices need to be addressed.
Controlling electronic current is essential to modern electronics, as data and signals are transferred by streams of electrons which are controlled at high speed. Demands on transmission speeds are also increasing as technology develops. Scientists from the Chair of Laser Physics and the Chair of Applied Physics at Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU) have succeeded in switching on a current with a desired direction in graphene using a single laser pulse within a femtosecond – a femtosecond corresponds to the millionth part of a billionth of a second. This is more than a thousand times faster compared to the most efficient transistors today.
UK company G2O Water Technologies has signed an agreement with an unnamed consumer products company to test and evaluate its graphene-based water treatment filtration technology.
G2O’s technology works by creating low-cost printed graphene filters or by applying a graphene coating to existing membranes used in water filtration processes.
This allows more water to pass through a membrane and is said to reduce the amount of energy needed to filter the water passing through the membrane by up to 50 percent.
The exponential growth rates of population density and the worldwide economy has required a significant investment in energy storage devices, particularly those which are portable and can be used for future flexible electronics.
As attention continues to be drawn on the superior properties exhibited by graphene, Researchers from around the world continue to work towards emulating this thin and intrinsic design with other potentially useful materials. In their own quest to develop thin and electrically conductive sheets for future electronic device applications, a group of Researchers led by Raymond McQuaid, Amit Kumar and Marty Gregg from Queens University have developed “domain walls” that exist within crystalline materials.
The structure of graphene is comprised of a single thin layered sheet of tightly packed carbon atoms arranged in the vertices of a hexagonal lattice resembling honey comb.
Graphite, on the other hand, is made up of several layers of graphene stacked on top of each other with an inter-planar distance of 0.335 nm between the subsequent layers. Graphene is the thinnest single atom-thick material known to man, it is extremely lightweight weighing only 0.77 mg per square meter. Despite its light weight, graphene is 100 – 300 times stronger than steel with a tensile stiffness of 150,000,000 psi.
Graphene and CNT applications within the advanced composites sector are still at a relatively early stage of the commercialization process, but as the availability of materials or dispersions of consistent quality has increased, a number of composite materials and components are starting to incorporate these nanomaterials.