When Will Graphene Be Commonly Used?

Coal and Related Carbon Resources / Lignite, Graphite, Graphene, & Carbon Uses

Date posted: 04/12/15

Katherine Bourzac reports that graphene, a form of carbon that is just one atom thick, does have truly superlative electronic, optical, and mechanical properties. But some applications envisioned for graphene, such as in computers, are appearing to be unrealistic. Nonetheless, the material may become a key component in flexible electronic displays, high-energy batteries, and other products. Some of the graphene best properties are mechanical. It is flexible and stretchy. In 2008, researchers at Columbia University showed that graphene was the strongest material ever tested. Researchers at the University of Texas at Dallas, led by Ray Baughman, have been working to take advantage of this combination of strength, flexibility, and high conductivity in graphene textiles. Graphene yarns can be made into artificial muscles or combined with battery materials to power wearable electronics. Researchers at Rice University in Houston have been making great strides on other carbons as well. Adding graphene to battery electrodes could make high-energy batteries which will help cars drive farther and make electronics last longer between charges more mechanically stable. In 2011, researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, used graphene to sandwich and stabilize tin battery electrodes. One of those researchers, Yuegang Zhang, subsequently moved his lab to China in the hopes of commercializing this work more quickly. In 2014, his group at the Chinese Academy of Sciences showed that graphene sandwiches stabilize sulfur electrodes.