April 2013

Researchers from China's Xinyang Normal University developed a new titanium dioxide-modified graphene electrode that can detect the electrochemical signals of Orange II. This material, commonly used in OLEDs, wood stains and the textiles industry is sometimes illegally used to add red color to food, even though it is highly toxic.

The researchers say that their electrode detected nanomolar concentrations of Orange II in ketchup and chili product samples. Current Orange II detection techniques, such as chromatography-mass spectrometry and polarography, require complicated instrumentation and are time consuming and unsuitable for in situ analysis.

SiNode Systems was chosen as the top startup company in the 2013 Rice Business Plan Competition (which they say is the largest business plan competition in the world). SiNode's prize is valued at $911,400, and incldues $700,000 in equity investments, $110,000 in additional cash prizes and $101,400 of business services (including office space, marketing support and business mentoring|).

SiNode, established in 2013 to commercialize a novel anode Li-ion battery technology developed at Northwestern University, developed a composite material of silicon nano-particles and graphene in a layered structure. The company says that their material will enable 10 times higher battery capacity and a tenfold decrease in charging time compared with current technology.

Cheap Tubes purchased equipment that will be used in their graphene paper R&D. The company bought this used equipment at an auction (it was previously used by now-bankrupt solar panel maker Konarka) and will install it in its new Rockingham, Vermont facility.

Cheap Tubes plans to retrofit the equipment for the manufacture of graphene paper, and hopes to begin testing in about 3 months. Cheap Tubes is partnering with American Graphite Technologies, which will supply them with graphite materials. AGT is a publicly traded mineral exploration and technology development company.

Graphene Technologies has been issued a US patent (#8,420,042) for a process for atom-by-atom synthesis of graphene by the exothermic chemical reduction of carbon dioxide. The company says that this new process is a breakthrough in graphene production, and it represents a dramatic departure from the current methods of producing graphene, such as chemical vapor deposition and chemical exfoliation of graphite.

The company says that using this new process allows them to produce bulk volumes of pristine, few-layer graphene platelets from inexpensive, commonly available feedstock. The reaction uses carbon dioxide to oxidize magnesium at temperatures up to 7,000°F, forming nano-scale magnesium oxide and carbon. The produced graphene's morphology is controlled by process parameters (reaction temperature, thermal gradient and pressure). It's also possible to chemically functionalize or dope the produced graphene.

Researchers from the Beijing National Laboratory for Molecular Sciences have demonstrated complex fractal geometric patters etched on graphene. The researchers used as-grown graphene film on a liquid copper surface. By using Ar/H₂ (argon / hydrogen) gas, they were able to etch the graphene.

The researchers found out that low gas flow rates results in simple hexagonal holes (top-left). But the faster the flow rate, the more complex and dynamic the pattern the emerges.

Researchers from the Argonne National Laboratory have discovered that graphene is an excellent steel lubricants. In fact it turns out that graphene dramatically reduces the amount of wear and friction in sliding steel surfaces, because of graphene's low shear and highly protective nature. The graphene lubricants also prevented oxidation of the steel surfaces when present at sliding contact interfaces.

Current lubricants are made from environmentally unfriendly additives or solid lubricants (such as molybdenum disulfide or boric acid). Both Oil-based and solid lubricants wear in time and need to be consistently reapplied. Graphene on the other time, can last a considerable length of time due to the flakes’ ability to reorient themselves during initial wear cycles. Graphene, made entirely out of carbon is environmentally friendly.

Researchers from Northwestern University developed a new approach for inkjet printed graphene inks (made from graphene flakes). The new process does not leave any residues on the graphene, and it also produces a graphene ink with a low number of flake-to-flake junctions. This results in highly conductive ink.

The process uses ethanol as a solvent and ethyl cellulose as a stabilizing polymer. The outcome of this is a 15% graphene black powder. The graphene flakes are 50x50 nm² in size. This powder is then dispersed into a solvent and this creates a fluid ink. The researchers demonstrated inkjet printing - which can be used to make precise patterns, and even multiple-layer structures.

Researchers from Japan's National Institute for Materials Science (NIMS) and Germany's Max Planck Institute developed a new 2D organic material made from thiopene. Thiophene has been already been suggested for several applications (including OLED panels, OPVs and field effect transistors). This is the first time that a simple and efficient production process (solution-based with high crystallinity) for thiopnene has been developed.

Using an alternating copolymer (which is made from thiophene derivative and flexible ethylene glycol chains) and then folding it in organic solvents in a specific makes the material self-assemble in 2D sheets. This method will hopefully lead to a simple and efficient way to fabricate such sheets.

The UK's Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) awarded the University of Nottingham with £1.3 million (just over $2 million) that will be used to buy a new molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) system. This new system will enable the growth of high quality, large area layers of graphene and boron nitride.

Researchers from the University plan to study new materials based on graphene and boron nitride for electronic and optoelectronic applications.

Researchers from the DOE's Brookhaven National Laboratory developed a new catalyst (made from Graphene, molybdenum and soybeans) and that could replace platinum in hyroden-production processes. This new catalyst is the best non-noble-metal one ever developed, and it's even better than a catalyst made from bulk platinum. It can be used to split water into hydrogen and oxygen. The hydrogen can then be used regenerated into H2 and then be used as fuel.

To make the new catalyst, the researchers ground soybeans into a powder and then mixed it it with ammonium molybdate. Using a high-temperature carburization made the molybdenum react with the carbon and nitrogen in the soybean and that produced molybdenum carbides and molybdenum nitrides. The material was then anchored on sheets of graphene - and this makes the catalyst effecting in devices such as batteries, supercapacitors, fuel cells, and water electrolyzers.