Graphene applications: what is graphene used for? - Page 6

Solidion Technology has announced that its silicon-rich anode material has passed a critical milestone test. The Company stated that its silicon/graphene anode materials have been validated by an EV OEM-appointed third party, that found that its silicon composition is on par with Silane gas-derived Si at a substantially lower cost to EV manufacturers.

The quantity of energy that a lithium-ion battery can supply to an electric vehicle (EV) is limited by the amount of charges stored in its anode and cathode materials. Although graphite has been the preferred anode material during the past 30 years, Industry-leading EV OEMs have reportedly concluded that silicon anode is required to drive EV battery technology to lower cost and provide higher energy density, significantly extending the EV driving range. Specifically, silicon (Si) is a leading-edge anode material capable of extending the EV range by 20-40%. However, the higher-capacity gain is limited by the technical issue of large volume change-induced rapid capacity decay. Additionally, most of the silicon-based anode materials have suffered from processing difficulty using current lithium-ion battery equipment and process.

Mito Material Solutions has announced a product line expansion by core sporting customer St. Croix Fly. In October 2023, Mito shared how the fly fishing rod company incorporated its functionalized graphene into the composite rods to enable faster recovery, increase torsional rigidity and improve strength-to-weight ratios.

St. Croix’s Technica Series rods were conceived and delivered to give anglers “the upper hand in the trickiest of trout-fishing situations.” Its responsive, moderate action, paired with the use of carbon fiber and Mito’s graphene technology, adds to the line’s speed, endless loop stability and accuracy.

Salgenx, developer of saltwater flow battery technology, has announced the expansion of its development of graphene and hard carbon-coated sand. Originally designed for use in advanced battery systems, Salgenx is now exploring a wide array of new applications for this innovative material, ranging from smart infrastructure to environmental sustainability.

The Company says that "the unique combination of graphene and hard carbon in a sand aggregate has the potential to transform the construction industry". By enhancing the electrical conductivity, mechanical strength, and durability of concrete, Salgenx’s carbon-coated sand opens up new possibilities in building and infrastructure development.

Chang Robotics, an engineering company, and Northwestern University’s INVO Lab have announced a joint venture aimed at reducing contamination from microplastics and poly-fluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) in the US food supply.  

This collaboration has led to the development of GOEco, an initiative that shows that very small amounts of graphene oxide can be infused into paper products or compostable packaging materials to replace plastic and PFAS. GOEco’s primary goal is to replace the widespread use of plastics in food packaging, such as paper plates and disposable utensils. The patent-pending technology helps enhance the environmental friendliness of disposable tableware without compromising functionality.

Researchers have used a specially crafted electric potential to manipulate the electronic band structure of graphene, laying the groundwork for on-demand electronic band design. 

Scientists have long been trying to tune the electronic band structures of materials so that those materials exhibit desired physical properties. In the past few years, researchers have shown they can manipulate the band structures of graphene and other 2D materials using electric-field configurations that produce simple periodic potentials. Now, Changgan Zeng at the University of Science and Technology of China and his colleagues have shown that they can achieve greater control over the band structure using an electric potential with a shape that resembles a basket-weaving pattern known as kagome.

GraphEnergyTech, developer of a process to integrate graphene electrodes into solar cells to replace silver, has announced a £1 million (over USD$1.2 million) equity raise to accelerate development and scale up of its advanced high-conductivity graphene electrodes.

The fundraising was led by Aramco Ventures, the corporate venturing arm of Aramco, a leading integrated energy and chemicals company.

Today we published a new edition of our Graphene Supercapacitors Market Report, with all the latest information. The supercapacitor market and industry is facing high demand and graphene is a pivotal material for this application.

Reading this report, you'll learn all about:

• The advantages of using graphene in supercapacitors
• Various types of graphene materials
• Market insights and forecasts
• What's on the market today

The report package also provides:

• A list of all graphene companies involved with supercapacitors
• Prominent research activity in this field
• Free updates for a year

This Graphene Supercapacitors market report provides a great introduction to graphene materials used in the supercapacitor market, and covers everything you need to know about graphene in this niche. This is a great guide for anyone involved with the supercapacitor market, nanomaterials, electric vehicles and mobile devices.

Researchers from the Czech Republic's Palacký University’s CATRIN, the University of West Bohemia, and VSB-TUO have developed an innovative sensor capable of accurately measuring temperatures between 10 and 90 degrees Celsius. This novel sensor, based on a novel graphene derivative, stands out for its high precision, reliability, and resistance to humidity. Its applications range from industrial production and storage areas requiring remote temperature monitoring to integration into protective clothing.

“We developed the new material using fluorographene chemistry by removing fluorine atoms and attaching benzylamine to the available reactive sites. This proved to be a crucial step in creating the temperature sensor. This technology allowed us to significantly minimize the adverse effects of humidity, typically the most challenging issue for such devices,” explained Petr Jakubec from CATRIN, a co-author of the study published in the prestigious journal Advanced Electronic Materials.

NanoGraf, an advanced battery material company, announced earlier this month the successful completion of the first large volume production run of its M38 18650 cell for the U.S. military.

Nanograf, formerly called SiNode Systems, pursues advances in Lithium-ion battery anodes for a wide range of industries from consumer electronics to electric vehicles. NanoGraf explaines that it uses a proprietary silicon alloy-graphene material architecture to overcome the silicon anode technical hurdles. The combination of silicon-based alloys and a flexible 3D graphene network helps stabilize the active material during charge and discharge. The company’s manufacturing process is different from others that rely on expensive and complex vapor deposition-based systems. Instead, a wet chemistry process has been developed that is highly scalable and already proven in a multi-ton-scale pilot manufacturing line in Japan. The anode material drops into existing electrode mixing and coating equipment and has been validated in large-scale battery manufacturing facilities.

NTT Corporation, along with The University of Tokyo and National Institute for Materials Science (NIMS), showed that graphene plasmon wave packets can be generated, manipulated and read out on-chip using terahertz electronics.  

The team managed to electrically generate and control graphene plasmon wave packets with a pulse width of 1.2 picoseconds. This result shows that the phase and amplitude of a terahertz signal can be controlled electrically by using graphene plasmons. It enables terahertz signal processing, a method different from conventional electrical circuit technology using transistors and is expected to contribute to realizing ultrahigh-speed signal processing in the future.