The GRAPHENE mega thread - because it's technology you need to know about!

a reply to: Thermo Klein

I see some weaponry material in that conductive paint...like you said, nefarious things.

Also sounds pretty useful! Seems like this could be a breakthrough material.

On the other hand, this could be used to create invincible soldiers who serve an unfair government, sent in to gather people into F.E.M.A camps at some point.

With such power hopefully comes responsibility.

a reply to: Blue2K4

Hi Blue!

I found this thread seriously neglected. As discoveries were being announced almost every other day, I resurrected it. I've been trying to keep this topic going because it is "technology you need to know about"!!

OP (original post or poster) has not been active on ATS for a number of years.

This has been a "breakthrough" material since it was discovered! And all these years later, we are still waiting for that breakthrough product to arrive.

Thanks for the interest! Nice to know some people are still interested. I'll keep updating when I can.

Scientists have found a way to make carbon both very hard and very stretchy by heating it under high pressure. This "compressed glassy carbon", developed by researchers in China and the US, is also lightweight and could potentially be made in very large quantities. This means it might be a good fit for several sorts of applications, from bulletproof vests to new kinds of electronic devices.

...

...When the researchers squeezed several sheets of graphene together at high temperatures, they found certain carbon atoms were exactly in the right position to form sp³ bonds between the layers.

phys.org, June 26, 2017 - New form of carbon discovered that is harder than diamond but flexible as rubber.

They haven't even got graphene production done and they made something even better. SP-2 is carbon in the form of graphite/graphene while the SP-3 is the cubic form or diamond. They stacked layers of graphene on top of each other and forced the sheets to bond like diamond in places. Since graphene is stretchy and diamond is hard they got both types in one product! "Compressed glassy carbon"?? Needs a better name! Like "flubber"! How about, "flex-o-glass"?

Light weight bullet proof vests would be a great use!

Guinness World Records has named the graphene aerogel as "the least dense 3-D printed structure." The 3-D printed graphene aerogel weighs 0.5 milligrams per cubic centimeter. The researchers developed the material in February 2016 and have received the official recognition from GUINNESS WORLD RECORDS. Their achievement will be featured in the Guinness World Records 2018 Edition.

phys.org, June 28, 2017 - Guinness World Records names graphene aerogel as world's least dense 3-D printed structure

Now MIT engineers have fabricated a functional dialysis membrane from a sheet of graphene.... The graphene membrane, about the size of a fingernail [1 cm square], is less than 1 nanometer thick. (The thinnest existing membranes are about 20 nanometers thick.) The team's membrane is able to filter out nanometer-sized molecules from aqueous solutions up to 10 times faster than state-of-the-art membranes, with the graphene itself being up to 100 times faster.

phys.org, June 29, 2017 - Scientists produce dialysis membrane made from graphene.

“One of the graphene’s special features is that the electrons move much faster than in most semiconductors used today. Thanks to this we can access the high frequencies (100-1000 times higher than gigahertz) that constitutes the terahertz range. Data communication then has the potential of becoming up to ten times faster and can transmit much larger amounts of data than is currently possible”, says Andrei Vorobiev

Sciencebusiness.net, June 29, 2017 - Graphene research at Chalmers could lead the way to future communications

Not quite “three for Thursday” but close. And there is still time left in the day!

3D printed aerogel is going to be used everywhere. They don’t say if they froze it afterwards but I think they were just showing what is possible (the photo with the story is a cube of graphene aerogel resting on a wheat frond that is not bending). Great win!

Filtration membranes were mentioned when graphene was first discovered. I think Lockheed has already fabricated one for water filtration. The article goes on and on how they made it and they did not perforate the entire surface! They only did 10% and it still out performed current state-of-the-art membranes. Should the production of graphene ever come around this would be a god send for people world-wide. Probably put Brita out of a job or make them a juggernaut. This would be very disruptive technology.

Terahertz communication? Bring it on! This is a study (paper) presented at some gathering. Although they have a graphene transistor grafted onto silicon demonstrating POC they do not have fully functional devices. With this announcement though they are step closer.

In a new study published in Materials Today Energy, the researchers have shown that they can use CO2 and solar thermal energy to produce high yields of millimeter-length carbon nanotube (CNT) wool at a cost of just $660 per ton. The market value of long CNTs like these—which can be woven into textiles to make metals, cement replacements, and other materials—is currently $100,000-$400,000 per ton.

"We have introduced a new class of materials called 'Carbon Nanotube Wool,' which are the first CNTs that can be directly woven into a cloth, as they are of macroscopic length and are cheap to produce," Licht told Phys.org. "The sole reactant to produce the CNT wools is the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide."

phys.org, July 19, 2017 - Cleaning up CO2 emissions could be worth millions.

Of that is not the whole story. They have created a catalyst, molten lithium carbonate, to convert CO2 to CNTs. They also had to swap out their cathode for another formulized material to get the CNTs to grow that long (mm instead of nm).

The researchers claim that an area that is 4% of the Sahara could scrub enough CO2 out of the atmosphere to put the level back to pre-industrial era levels in a decade (same source).

Well, after reading further it is a team from the Carbon X Prize. It may even be the one I've mentioned here and there on other threads. IIRC, the output is oxygen and CNTs. The problem, as pointed out, if they do this then the price drops from the 300 K/ton. But that is OK because you are not using fossil fuels to do this. Price may drop and the profit would not be as high as the article title makes it sound but you are saving the planet!

When will people realize that the ambient CO2 can be utilized to create energy or other useful products? Right now it is free for the taking. CNT wool is just the beginning. Now we get to see how this process scales up.

[Researchers] reported the synthesis of a large sheet of monolayer single-crystal graphene. This result allows a leap forward in graphene production to an optimized method of fabricating an almost-perfect (> 99.9 % aligned) 5 × 50 cm2 single-crystal graphene in just 20 minutes. Moreover, the low production costs, comparable to commercially available lower-quality polycrystalline graphene films, could expand its usability.

Although previous reports have addressed some of the above challenges, this study overcame all [four] of them and made the synthesis of meter-sized single-crystal graphene possible. The degree of the misaligned graphene islands is less than 0.1 percent, amounting to negligible defects and grain boundaries in the products.

phys.org, July 26, 2017 - Large single-crystal graphene is possible.

Not just "possible" but doable! They did this in a couple steps. First, they grew a copper foil on top of a slab of copper. This foil is what allowed the next part to happen because it was flat at the atomic level. They then used CVD to put carbon onto the foil. At the temperature they wanted, the carbon molecules started linking up to form crystals (like growing a snowflake!) These islands then hooked up with other islands making a sheet of graphene on a copper foil on top of a copper slab.

Then you remove the copper foil. Use a chemical process to dissolve the copper substrate. Then all you have left is a sheet of pure, crystal graphene!

They wanted the pure crystal graphene for use in electronics. I want to see roll-to-roll production of the stuff!!

Now to see how this can be scaled up.

The electrolytic film produced at Rice and tested at Houston is a three-layer structure of nickel, grapheme and a compound of iron, manganese and phosphorus. The foamy nickel gives the film a large surface, the conductive graphene protects the nickel from degrading and the metal phosphide carries out the reaction.

The robust material is the subject of a paper in Nano Energy.

phys.org, July 26, 2017 - Scientists produce robust catalyst to split water into hydrogen, oxygen.

They made a nickel "foam" then CVD (chemical vapor deposition) the graphene onto that, then they added the metal compound. That barrier means that instead of having one catalyst to make either oxygen or hydrogen from electrolytic reaction (a small current is used). This new compound uses less of a current and produces both hydrogen and oxygen at the same time. Hydrogen goes towards the electrode while oxygen is drawn towards the anode.

Previously they were using platinum as one of the catalysts for hydrogen production. That made electrolysis for hydrogen cost prohibitive. None of the materials in their new catalyst has that problem.

Let's see. We can use graphene to pre-filter sea water for deuterium ("heavy water" which is a fuel for nuclear fusion). Then go through a different sized filter to get non-saline water. Use the new catalyst on that water and get both oxygen and hydrogen.

Will graphene help usher in the Hydrogen Economy?

First Graphite has received approval from the WA [Western Australia] Department of Environment Regulation for the construction of a graphene production facility at the Australian Marine Complex at Henderson near Perth. This will be operational in the fourth quarter of this year. First Graphite said it will be the first ASX-listed company to have a commercial graphene production capability.

The facility will cost less than $1 million and will be funded from existing cash. Initial capacity will be 20 to 25 tonnes per annum of saleable grapheme.

...

First Graphite produces high quality graphene from high grade Sri Lankan vein graphite.

The development of two product lines are the focus of the First Graphite and University of Adelaide work with ARC Graphene Research Hub - graphene paints for fire resistive coatings for wall papers, fibres, wood fences and building cladding; and fire resistive engineered wood such as particle-board, chip board and gyprock.

Sharecafe.com.au, Aug. 16., 2017 - First Commercial Graphene Facility.

World's First (??) Graphene Production Plant!! There are a couple others out there selling to other manufacturers but nothing like this. Looks like they are exfoliating graphite down to make platelets. If they market it correctly they could have an instant customer with cash on hand in Dubai to replace all those plastic filled aluminum panels that keep catching fire.

Australia is a great place to actually test out paints since it gets nice and toasty there! Keep the cooling bill down by switching to graphene paint. If that actually works then I would say they have a winner right there. There is also the company in Australia that was going to make graphene batteries so if they combine resources all the old, exploding kind, could be replaced by shiny, new, longer charge, non-exploding graphene batteries!

Way to go Australia!

#1

A team of Researchers from Japan and Taiwan have created a new CVD approach to grow graphene at temperatures as low as 50 °C using a dilute methane vapor source and a molten gallium catalyst [CVD - chemical vapor deposition]. Reducing the temperature in graphene CVD synthesis methods can be extremely beneficial integration of graphene in various applications, like the direct integration of CVD-grown graphene into electronic devices.

The team explains that in silicon-based electronics, the upper temperature threshold that the components can withstand upon graphene integration is around 400 °C. The threshold is even lower for plastic semiconducting devices, which can only withstand up to 100 °C during the graphene growing process. Under traditional conditions, graphene growth occurs at around 1000 °C and has not been suitable for the direct integration into such electronic devices.

graphene-info.com, Oct. 11, 2017 - A new CVD approach may grow graphene at low temperatures.


#2

China Carbon Graphite Group, a producer engaging in the research and development, production and sales of graphene and graphene oxide, recently announced a pilot scale production of high quality graphene and GO [graphene-oxide] in a collaboration with Hunan University.

graphene-info.com, Oct. 12, 2017 - CCGG announces pilot scale production of high quality graphene.


#3

Talga has reportedly received highly encouraging results from 1,200 hours of testwork on a new Li-ion battery anode formulation that combines both its micrographite and GNP [graphene nano particles] materials.

The anode exhibited outstanding electrochemical performance across a range of key industry measures, including reversible capacity of ~420mAh/g over a 100 cycle average with a retention of 99.5% and coulombic efficiency of 99.9%. The capacity measure reflects a ~20% increase in capacity performance compared to commercially available graphite anodes (usually around 330mAh/g).

graphene-info.com, Oct. 12, 2017 - Talga reports progress in graphene-enhanced batteries project.

A three-for with very little effort! graphene-info is a graphene only news/blog site.

The first announcement means an easier method of making graphene enabled devices, like plastics, directly on the material itself instead of multi-step processes and transference.

The pilot plant blurb also stated that the university figured out a one-step method of production (their previous method was a two-step process). Looks like China versus Australia are in a race for graphene dominance!

The Talga battery anode keeps making progress! This is really cool news since nobody else is releasing any test results just the headline grabbing "graphene battery breakthrough" followed by silence. 1,200 tests, 100 cycles, and decent numbers. They need to demonstrate 1,000 cycles to see how it directly compares to li-ion (for example, the Mac book is designed to make it to 80% retention at that number of cycles). It is nice to see they went from a demo size (about the size of a big-ish watch battery) to a "normal" pack size. That means they are scaling up nicely! I do hope the cycles also scale up.

Japan, China, and UK (Talga)... where is the USA??!!?? There had been lab bench announcements out of Stanford, UCLA, and MIT, and now crickets. Really, the US should be leading in this department! Oh, I am sure that when somebody makes an announcement the US will chirp in and show its hand but the silence, so far, is disheartening.

a reply to: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

Thank you for the updates... I do want you to know that I check in occasionally to see what else has come along

a reply to: HarryJoy

Thanks,

Nice to know others are interested in the topic and that updates are appreciated.

It has been a long, strange, journey! Learning about quality, production methods, start-ups, from lab to product, etc., it is not "check this out" and "Hey! That is cool! Have some money!"

It is also frustrating as it seems every few months there is a "graphene battery!" announcement. The only real one that is sharing their data is the one in the UK. They had that battle over the light bulb (how cool would that be?! Or have been...), so I get the hesitation. I did not post it here but there has been an international standard written for what constitutes graphene, GO, single-layer, bi-layer, and multi-layer. That is a great step! The US now has a snur on carbon nanotubes (significant new use rules). So it is starting. Slowly.

My enthusiasm has been reigned back in a bit. I'm posting more production news than "lab bench" stories because all that ground work will have to be done before this tech is wide spread. Although b1tchin' high-tech is also fun!

Graphene are definitely the strongest team on the Apprentice UK right now!

Graphene is really awesome and versatile material. Also it is no longer just a laboratory experiment. It is getting used in lots of different products to enhance their properties already (some usage here). Iam really looking forward to see much faster development of these materials in the future.

Scientists from the University of York and Roma Tre University claim that ultra-low-power transistors could be built using composite materials featuring monolayers of graphene and transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDC [you will also see it as "TMD" and "TMDs"]). These materials, they note, could be used to achieve fine electrical control over electron spin.

...

The team showed that when a small current is passed through the graphene layer, the electrons’ spin polarise in plane due to ‘spin-orbital’ forces brought about by the proximity to the TMDC base. They also showed the efficiency of charge-to-spin conversion can be quite high, even at room temperature.

Professor Roberto Raimondi, who leads the spintronics group at Roma Tre University, noted: “The possibility of orienting the electron spin with electrical currents is attracting a lot of attention in the spintronics community and arises generally as a consequence of specific symmetry conditions.

newelectronics.co.uk, Nov. 8, 2017 - Graphene, TMDC combo could enable ultra low power transistors.

TMDs, one of my favorite 2D materials. It is also a 2D material that works as a semiconductor which is where graphene is having problems. If you combine the two you start to gain atomic effects like spin alignment. That is, the spin does not scatter but lines up due to atomic interaction. Which means it can be used to efficiently transport data and the processing of that data all at the spin level. The not so cool part is you do not need to spend the money or time cooling the whole thing down because it works are room temperature!

Combined with graphene as an electric transport... well everything shrinks to atomically thin. That would reduce size, power consumption, and open up other avenues of invention like topological insulators (which is what I guess they made! You can have insulators, conductors, and semiconductors, so adding graphene, to a semiconductor should be the same).

Two things to note. Now they need to tune the substances to work together. And make a manufacturing process! CVD is OK for small run items but manufacturing levels are needed. Pushing things around with an electron microscope (epitaxy) is not a suitable manufacturing method either.

Cool news none the less!

a reply to: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

Very interesting. Turning co2 into useable materials.

a reply to: Thermo Klein

when is it coming onto the market, how much will it cost and what tools would be requried to work with it.

Applause for this great thread and also the work TEOTWAWKIAIFF puts into it.

originally posted by: Azureblue
a reply to: Thermo Klein

when is it coming onto the market, how much will it cost and what tools would be requried to work with it.

its what black triangles are made of. one way they cloak is by bending light with the graphene skin.

a reply to: yuppa

Does it cure cancer too?

originally posted by: Phage
a reply to: yuppa

Does it cure cancer too?

Once it becomes a ubiquitous, super material that is everywhere and in pretty much everything, that's when it will cause, rather than cure cancer.
It'll probably be the new asbestos...but I might be a cynic.