Zentek has provided an update on recent commercialization activities for its ZenGUARD™ Antimicrobial Surgical Masks.

As previously announced in July 2024, the Company embarked on a Canada-wide sampling program for dental professionals facilitated by Henry Schein Inc. that saw ZenGUARD™ Antimicrobial Surgical Masks included in product shipments to Henry Schein customers across Canada. As a result of this program, the Company is now reportedly seeing increased demand from Henry Schein, the world’s largest provider of health care solutions to office-based dental and medical practitioners with a presence in 33 countries.

While graphene aerogels have advantageous properties like extremely low weight, high porosity and good electrical conductivity, engineers who tried to use them to develop pressure sensors have encountered some difficulties. 

Image credit: Nano Letters 2024

Specifically, many of these materials have an intrinsically stiff microstructure, which poses limits on their strain sensing capabilities. Researchers from Xi'an Jiaotong University, Northumbria University, UCLA, University of Alberta and other institutes recently introduced a new fabrication strategy for synthesizing aerogel metamaterials to overcome this limitation. This strategy fabricates a durable graphene oxide-based aerogel metamaterial that exhibits a remarkable sensitivity to human touch and motion.

U.S-based Lyten announced plans to invest more than $1 billion to build the world’s first Lithium-Sulfur battery gigafactory. The facility will be located near Reno, Nevada, and will have the capability to produce up to 10 GWh of batteries annually at full scale. Phase 1 of the facility is scheduled to come online in 2027.

Lyten’s proprietary processes permanently sequester carbon from methane in the form of 3D Graphene and utilize the supermaterial to develop decarbonizing applications. Lyten has received more than $425 million in investment from companies including Stellantis, FedEx, Honeywell, Walbridge, the European Investment Fund, and the Luxembourg Future Fund.

Researchers from ISMN-CNR have introduced GrapheNet, a deep learning framework based on an Inception-Resnet architecture using image-like encoding of structural features for the prediction of the properties of nanographenes.

Scheme of the GrapheNet framework. Image from Scientific Reports

By exploiting the planarity of quasi-bidimensional systems and through encoding structures into images, and leveraging the flexibility and power of deep learning in image processing, Graphenet is said to achieve significant accuracy in predicting the physicochemical properties of nanographenes. 

The European Investment Bank (EIB) is offering Italian materials manufacturer BeDimensional €20 million (almost USD$22 million) in venture debt financing to expand production of Few-Layer Graphene (FLG) and Few-Layer Hexagonal Boron Nitride (FLhBN or FLB).  

EIB Vice-President Gelsomina Vigliotti and BeDimensional Chief Executive Officer Vittorio Pellegrini announced the financing accord at the inauguration of the company's plant in Genoa. BeDimensional plans to build a second plant in Italy to scale-up production of FLG and FLB by 2027.

Versarien has announced it has raised £450,000 (almost USD$585,000) by way of a placing new ordinary shares in the capital of the Company. 

The net proceeds of the Placing will be used to further increase the Company's in-house concrete and mortar testing capabilities and fund external UKAS accredited testing services for 3D construction printed products, as well as for general corporate and working capital purposes.

Graphene Manufacturing Group (GMG) has provided a commercialization update on its THERMAL-XR Powered by GMG Graphene technology, highlighting ongoing customer engagements, testing, and industry recognition.

At a recent event in Brisbane, GMG re-launched its product, now branded as THERMAL-XR ENHANCE, which boasts improved heat transfer and corrosion protection capabilities. In a statement, GMG said that the rebranding from THERMAL-XR RESTORE reflects the product's expanded applications, including enhancing heat transfer in new HVAC equipment, a capability reportedly confirmed through third-party verification.

Concretene has received a £3 million (around USD$3.9 million) investment to advance its carbon-saving concrete technology. 

The funding will be used for product certification and preparation for market entry, enhancing their eco-friendly concrete alternatives. This investment seeks to leverage the unique properties of graphene to reduce the carbon footprint of concrete.

A research team from the University of Córdoba (UCO) has developed a new prototype that could lead opens the door to the large-scale production of graphene. This new method, which has already been registered for evaluation as a patent and is based on a previous patent by the same team, increases the production of graphene by more than 22%, with the process maintaining the high quality that characterizes graphene synthesized with this technology.

The work is based on plasma technology, a partially ionized gas often referred to as the fourth state of matter. One of its great advantages, highlighted the study's lead author, Francisco Javier Morales, is that "it is a highly energetic medium that is capable of breaking down organic molecules very easily." Specifically, the team used this plasma torch to break down ethanol and rearrange the molecule's carbon atoms, resulting in the creation of graphene.

Researchers from Penn State University and NASA Goddard Space Flight Center recently developed an 'electronic tongue' based on a graphene-based ion-sensitive field-effect transistor, capable of identifying differences in similar liquids, such as milk with varying water content; diverse products, including soda types and coffee blends; signs of spoilage in fruit juices; and instances of food safety concerns. The team also found that results were even more accurate when artificial intelligence (AI) used its own assessment parameters to interpret the data generated by the electronic tongue.

Graphene ISFET chip mounted on a printed circuit board (PCB). Image from: Nature

The sensor and AI can broadly detect and classify various substances while collectively assessing their respective quality, authenticity and freshness. This assessment has also provided the researchers with a view into how AI makes decisions, which could lead to better AI development and applications, they said.