Sunday, October 10, 2010

Graphene: 2010 Nobel in Physics

"Not only is graphene the thinnest possible material that is feasible, but it's also about 200 times stronger than steel and conducts electricity better than any material known to man—at room temperature. Researchers at Columbia University's Fu Foundation School of Engineering who proved that graphene is the strongest material ever measured said that "It would take an elephant, balanced on a pencil, to break through a sheet of graphene the thickness of Saran Wrap."

If you follow my work, you have surely heard me speak about Moore's Law and the race to find a suitable replacement for silicon semi-conductors. Graphene may in fact be the answer to these problems. The fastest growing problem facing chip engineers around the world is that everyone wants to increase power, make chips smaller and achieve both of these without significantly rising the temperature. The development of graphene transistors would in theory be able to run at much faster speeds and be able to ultimately battle the heat at a microscopic scale.

Just yesterday, two scientists; Konstantin Novoselow and Andre Geim, were awarded the 2010 Nobel Prize in physics for their pioneering work on the discovery of graphene. The award acknowledged graphene's promise to revolutionize the electronics industry and the potential production of lightweight, stronger-than-steel materials among a long list of other coming applications. Putting things into perspective, Geim states that he would "compare this situation with the one 100 years ago when people discovered polymers. It took some time before polymers went into use in plastics and became so important in our lives."

-Here

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