Graphene Flagship: Europe's $1 billion graphene initiative - Page 9

The PolyGraph project, a 4-year development project with aims to develop new production techniques to deliver industrial scale quantities of graphene-reinforced thermosetting polymers, has published its results.

The POLYGRAPH (Up-Scaled Production of Graphene Reinforced Thermosetting Polymers for Composite, Coating and Adhesive Applications) project brought together 14 partners, including SMEs, companies, universities and a research center, and has reportedly led to the identification of the most suitable materials and production techniques for graphene-based coatings, adhesives and composites. Once the graphene market reaches maturity and material prices drop , these new products could appeal to a vast range of industries.

The Graphene Pavilion at the GSMA Mobile World Congress has showcased two fascinating graphene-based photonics devices. The first is said to be the world's first all-graphene optical communication link operating at a data rate of 25 Gb/s per channel, and the second one, displayed at the Ericsson stand, is the first ultra-fast graphene-based photonic switch in an Ericsson testbed. These graphene-based photonic devices may become the building blocks of the next generation of mobile networks.

"5G will all be about optical communications, and the realization of the ultra-fast optical communication link with graphene is a real breakthrough. It is very exciting that it is already on display at the Ericsson stand," said ICREA Professor Frank Koppens from ICFO (The Institute of Photonic Sciences), Barcelona, the Scientific Chair of the Graphene Pavilion.

As part of a collaboration between the Graphene Flagship and the European Space Agency, experiments testing graphene for two different space-related applications have been performed. These have been reported to show very promising results, based on which the Flagship is to continue the development of graphene devices for use in space.

Graphene's excellent thermal properties are promising for improving the performance of loop heat pipes, thermal management systems used in aerospace and satellite applications. Graphene could also have a use in space propulsion, due to its lightness and strong interaction with light. The Graphene Flagship tested both these applications in recent experiments in November and December 2017.

Graphene Flagship partners Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia, Italy, in collaboration with FADEL, a leading Italian shoe company, have developed graphene-enhanced shoes. The new GET technology, patented by FADEL, reportedly gives the footwear better thermoregulation and freshness.

In this innovative shoe, when flakes consisting of several graphene layers are added to polyurethane, (the material of which the soles of FADEL shoes are made), laboratory tests show an augmented heat dispersion, a greater resistivity to water and enhanced antibacterial properties. Combining these effects with a ventilation system developed for this particular type of shoe yielded a better user experience. This prototype shoe was presented at the International Footwear Exhibition in Milan.

Researchers at Chalmers University have developed a flexible detector for terahertz frequencies (1000 gigahertz) using graphene transistors on plastic substrates. It is said to be the first of its kind, and can extend the use of terahertz technology to applications that require flexible electronics, like wireless sensor networks and wearable technology.

At room temperature, the translucent and flexible device detects signals in the frequency range 330 to 500 gigahertz. The technique can be used for imaging in the terahertz area (THz camera), but also for identifying different substances (sensor). It may also be of potential benefit in health care, where terahertz waves can be used to detect cancer. Other areas where the detector could be used are imaging sensors for vehicles or for wireless communications.

FLAG-ERA, a body that gathers regional and national funding organizations (NRFOs) in Europe with the goal of supporting the Future and Emerging Technologies (FET) Flagship concept (more specifically, the FET Flagship initiatives Graphene and Human Brain Project (HBP)), has announced the outcome of its call for projects in synergy with the Graphene Flagship and the Human Brain Project (FLAG-ERA JTC 2017).

Relating to the Graphene Flagship, in total 17 basic and applied research projects have been recommended for funding to the national research funding organizations by the FLAG-ERA JTC 2017 Call Steering Committee. The actual funding of the projects depends on the successful completion of the final funding decisions and contract negotiations at the national level. Once approved, the 17 recommended projects are expected to become partnering projects of the Graphene Flagship and to start between December 2017 and March 2018. Click here for the full projects list.

The European Commission has released an interim review report of the Graphene Flagship project's first year following the two-and-half-year ramp-up phase. The Graphene Flagship was concluded to have achieved most of its objectives and milestones and delivered exceptional results with significant immediate or potential impact. The Graphene Flagship is further commended for focusing its work towards a more industrially oriented initiative with a higher Technology Readiness Level.

The report mentioned several significant results close to commercial exploitation, including work with Airbus to produce aircraft parts made of graphene composites, a motorcycle helmet with a graphene coating, a new viscoelastic graphene-polymer sensor material, perovskite photovoltaic cells with improved stability and a demonstration of tuneable ion sieving using GO membrane for water desalination.

Researchers from CNR-Istituto Nanoscienze, Italy and the University of Cambridge, UK, associated with the ​Graphene Flagship, have shown that it is possible to create a terahertz saturable absorber using graphene, produced by liquid phase exfoliation and deposited by transfer coating and ink jet printing. The paper reports a terahertz saturable absorber with an order of magnitude higher absorption modulation than other devices produced to date.

A terahertz saturable absorber decreases its absorption of light in the terahertz range (far infrared) with increasing light intensity and has great potential for the development of terahertz lasers, with applications in spectroscopy and imaging. These high-modulation, mode-locked lasers open up many prospects in applications where short time scale excitation of specific transitions are important, such as time-resolved spectroscopy of gasses and molecules, quantum information or ultra-high speed communication.

Researchers from the University of Groningen developed a device made by 2D sheets of graphene and Boron-Nitride that showed unprecedented spin transport efficiency at room temperature.

The research, funded by the European Union's $1 billion Graphene Flagship, uses the single-layer graphene as the core material. The researchers say that graphene is a great material for spin transport - but the spin in the graphene cannot be manipulated. To overcome this in the device, the graphene is sandwiched between two layers of boron nitride and the whole structure rests on silicon.

Graphene Flagship Partners RWTH Aachen University and AMO GmbH, both based in Germany, recently launched a new joint research center with a focus on efficiently bridging the gap between fundamental science and applications within graphene and related materials based electronics and photonics.

The five founding Principal Investigators of the Aachen Graphene & 2D-Materials Center are all members of the Graphene Flagship and share the vision of bringing graphene and related materials research from the lab into applications. The Center will help to turn the exciting properties of graphene and 2D-materials into true functions, making these materials not only fascinating for scientists but also serving society, as was explained.