Investor Intel by Adrian Nixon | September 21, 2017
NASA got in touch with me. “Would I like to attend a briefing on a new graphene technology they had been working on?” The first thing I did was check up to make sure this was real. Yes it was the NASA Langley Research Center. So I joined a few others and listened attentively to what their scientists had to say about something they call holey graphene. Read on to find out more…
Dear InvestorIntel readers, you are sophisticated. So I’ll spare the usual graphene introductions and assume you know all about graphene’s amazing physical properties. I will draw your attention to one aspect of this material though. It is impermeable, even gases cannot pass through.
This impermeability is seen as an advantage because there are few other materials with this property. However there are situations where putting holes in graphene could be an advantage, such as making filters or electrodes for batteries and supercapacitors.
Graphene porosity currently means gaps between nanoplatelets
Regular readers will know about graphene filters, for example Manchester University has created a filter that can remove the salt from seawater.
They achieved this feat by making the filter from graphene nanoplatelets that were pressed together. Think of the nanoplatelets as stacks of playing cards viewed edge on. Water can be forced through the gaps between the layers, however salt molecules cannot pass through these gaps and this creates the separation effect.
Making holes within graphene nanoplatelets
Creating holes in graphene nanoplatelets makes graphene permeable. Other teams have done this. For example punching holes with an electron beam, or etching with oxygen plasma. Both of these methods are effective on the small scale but complicated and expensive to scale up.
The NASA process
More:
https://investorintel.com/sectors/technology/technology-intel/nasas-graphene-making-holes-within-graphene-nanoplatelets/
