Directa Plus has announced the installation of GiPave® at the Imola Circuit ahead of the upcoming Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix in May 2024, as part of the Formula 1 World Championship, making it the first circuit to feature green, sustainable and high-tech asphalt utilizing graphene and recycled plastics.

GiPave® was developed by Iterchimica and resulted from a multi-year research program conducted in collaboration with G.Eco of the A2A Group, the University of Milano-Bicocca, and Directa Plus. The product uses graphene supplied by Directa Plus alongside hard-to-recycle plastics, such as certain types of toys, fruit crates, and old CD cases that would not normally be recycled. The asphalt containing GiPave® can itself be entirely recycled, further reducing waste and the need for new materials.

Researchers from Princeton University, University of California, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and Japan's National Institute for Materials Science have used a special kind of microscope and two pieces of extremely defect-free graphene to capture the clearest and most direct images of a “Wigner crystal”, a structure made entirely of electrons.

Imaging a “Wigner crystal” is extremely hard. At room temperature, electrons can flow together in electric currents because their kinetic energy overcomes the force that makes particles with the same electric charge repel each other. At very low temperatures, however, repulsive electric forces win out, and the electrons end up arranging themselves into a uniform grid, or a crystal. Physicist Eugene Wigner predicted this phenomenon in 1934, but researchers only recently started to understand how to create Wigner crystals in the lab. 

Researchers from  Purdue University, University of California, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and Japan's National Institute for Materials Science have managed to electrically manipulate a ‘chiral interface state’ in twisted monolayer-bilayer graphene, with potential for energy-efficient microelectronics and quantum computing.

The international research team, led by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab), has taken the first atomic-resolution images and demonstrated electrical control of a chiral interface state – an exotic quantum phenomenon that could help researchers advance quantum computing and energy-efficient electronics.

A team from the National Hospital for Paraplegics (SESCAM), in collaboration with the Materials Science Institute of Madrid (ICMM-CSIC), has shown how new cell culture devices based on graphene oxide maintain the anti-inflammatory function of myeloid suppressor cells (MDSCs) once isolated from the donor's body. This function could be crucial for advancing cellular therapy beneficial to people with multiple sclerosis. 

"To exert their inflammation-controlling function in diseases such as multiple sclerosis, myeloid suppressor cells must maintain a very immature state. However, when extracted from the bone marrow and cultured in the laboratory, they begin to mature, losing their immunosuppressive activity, rendering them unsuitable for potential cellular therapy for patients with this type of neurodegenerative disease," explains Diego Clemente, a researcher at the National Hospital for Paraplegics and one of the lead authors of the study.

Today we have published the latest edition of our Graphene Construction Materials Market market report, a comprehensive guide to the world of graphene-enhanced construction materials. The edition, now updated to April 2024, includes over a dozen updates, new companies, new research results and more.

Reading this report, you'll learn all about:

• The advantages of using graphene in construction materials
• Companies involved in this industry
• Projects and trials underway today
• Research activities

The report package also provides:

• Datasheets and brochures from leading companies
• A look into how graphene can reduce carbon emissions
• A look into Chinese graphene construction materials projects
• Free updates for a year

This Graphene Construction Materials market report provides a great introduction to graphene materials used in the construction industry. It is a must-read guide for anyone interested in understanding the current market, mapping the companies involved and evaluating the future of the construction industry.

Researchers from Tohoku University, Tianjin University of Technology, Pohang University of Science and Technology and Johns Hopkins University recently designed a nanocellular graphene (NCG) film through the self-organization of carbon atoms using liquid metal dealloying and employing a defect-free amorphous precursor.

The flexible freestanding nanocellular graphene film. Image credit: Advanced Materials
 

Nanocellular graphene is a specialized form of graphene that achieves a large specific surface area by stacking multiple layers of graphene and controlling its internal structure with a nanoscale cellular morphology. NCG is attractive thanks to its potential to improve the performance of electronic devices, energy devices and sensors. However, its development has been hindered by defects that occur during the manufacturing process. Cracks often appear when forming NCG, and scientists are looking for new processing technologies that can fabricate homogeneous, crack-free and seamless NCGs at appropriate scales.

HydroGraph Clean Power has announced that it has completed the final tranche of its non-brokered private placement for aggregate gross proceeds of CAD$1,182,500 (over USD$871,000). In total, HydroGraph reported gross proceeds of approximately CAD$3.17 million (over USD$2,334,000) pursuant to the entire Offering.    

HydroGraph intends to use the net proceeds from the Offering for application development, business development and general working capital purposes.