Researchers from Northwestern University have developed a new method to oxidize graphene without the collateral damage encountered in the Hummers method commonly used. This process is reversible - which means it offers high tunability, and it outputs a chemically homogeneous graphene oxide.
The idea is to leak Oxygen into an ultra-high vacuum chamber where a hot tungsten filament is heated to 1500 degrees Celsius. This causes the oxygen molecules to dissociate into atomic oxygen which is them uniformly inserted into the graphene lattice.
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Posted: Feb 20,2012 by Ron Mertens