Although transistors developed by using carbon nanostructures seem to be a distant dream, they could become reality in the very near future. An international team of scientists in collaboration with Empa has been successful in developing nanotransistors by using graphene ribbons with a width of just few atoms. The study has been published in the latest issue of the Nature Communications journal.
A team in China has used graphene microsheets (GMs)—prepared from microcrystalline graphite minerals by an electrochemical & mechanical approach—as a special conductive support for sulfur for the cathode of a lithium-sulfur battery. The graphene microsheets feature excellent conductivity and low-defect, small sheet sizes of <1 μm2 and ≤ 6 atomic layers.
It is reported for the first time that iodine-doped reduced graphene oxide (I-rGO) has been designed as an anode material for sodium ion batteries (SIBs). In comparison to rGO, I-rGO with a high specific surface area exhibits a high reversible capacity (270 mA h g−1 at 50 mA g−1), good long-term cycling performance, with a high capacity of 212 mA h g−1 after 100 cycles, and excellent rate capability. The enhanced performance is due to defect evolution and enlarged layer distance by the doping of iodine atoms.
Development of inexpensive and robust electrocatalysts towards oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) is crucial for the cost-affordable manufacturing of metal-air batteries and fuel cells. In this article, the authors show that cross-linked CoMoO4 nanosheets and reduced graphene oxide (CoMoO4/rGO) can be integrated in a hybrid material under one-pot hydrothermal conditions, yielding a composite material with promising catalytic activity for oxygen reduction reaction (ORR).
A team of researchers at the University of Minnesota and Northwestern University, USA, have developed a printing method to produce flexible graphene micro-supercapacitors with a planar architecture suitable for integration in portable electronic devices.
Nanoscale heat flow plays a crucial role in many modern electronic and optoelectronic applications, such as thermal management, photodetection, thermoelectrics and data communication. Two-dimensional layered materials could play a role in many of these applications. Perhaps even more promising are so-called van der Waals heterostructures, which consist of different layered two-dimensional materials stacked one on top of the other. These stacks can consist of materials with dramatically different physical properties, while the interfaces between them are ultra-clean and atomically sharp.
Corrosion is a deterioration of a metal due to reaction with environment. The use of corrosion inhibitors is one of the most effective ways of protecting metal surfaces against corrosion. Their effectiveness is related to the chemical composition, their molecular structures and affinities for adsorption on the metal surface.
In this research, copper nanocomposites reinforced by graphene nanoplatelets (GNPs) were fabricated using a wet mixing method followed by a classical powder metallurgy route. In order to find the best dispersion technique, ball milling and wet mixing were chosen.
Researchers from the University of Minnesota College of Science and Engineering have found yet another remarkable use for the wonder material graphene—tiny electronic “tweezers” that can grab biomolecules floating in water with incredible efficiency. This capability could lead to a revolutionary handheld disease diagnostic system that could be run on a smart phone.
An international team of researchers from Empa, the Max Planck Institute for Polymer Research in Mainz and the University of California at Berkeley has succeeded in growing graphene ribbons exactly nine atoms wide with a regular armchair edge from precursor molecules. The specially prepared molecules are evaporated in an ultra-high vacuum for this purpose. After several process steps, they are put on a gold base to form the desired nanoribbons of about one nanometer in width and up to 50 nanometers in length.