Graphene-Info newsletter

Goodyear to launch bicycle tires with graphene technology

Famous tire and rubber company Goodyear has launched two new bicycle tyres, Eagle F1 and Eagle F1 Supersport utilizing graphene technology and weighing just 180g for a 23mm model.

The new Eagle F1 is an “ultra-high-performance all-round road tire” and the Eagle F1 Supersport, which is even lighter, is aimed at the upper echelons of competition and will be suited to road racing, time trial and triathlon where speed trumps all other requirements.

Goodyear has developed a proprietary compound enhanced with graphene and “next-generation amorphous (non-crystalline) spherical Silica” to create what it labels Dynamic:GSR. The result of this is said to be a rubber that is able to deliver low rolling resistance, improved grip in the dry and wet and long-term durability.

New graphene-based lithium-air battery may enable longer-running electric cars

Researchers at the Korean Daegu Gyeongbuk Institute of Science and Technology (DGIST) have fabricated an electrode using nickel cobalt sulphide nanoflakes on a sulfur-doped graphene, leading to a long-life battery with high discharge capacity. This improvement of lithium-air batteries' performance may bring us a step closer to electric cars that can use oxygen to run longer before they need to recharge.

Shanmugam and his colleagues focused their research on improving the capacity of lithium-air batteries to catalyze the reactions between lithium ions and oxygen, which facilitate energy release and the recharging process. Their battery demonstrated a high discharge capacity while at the same time maintaining its battery performance for over two months without diminishing.

NIST-led team uses graphene to create and image coupled quantum dots

Researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and their colleagues have used graphene and STM technology to create and image a novel pair of quantum dots — tiny islands of confined electric charge that act like interacting artificial atoms. Such “coupled” quantum dots could serve as a robust quantum bit, or qubit, the fundamental unit of information for a quantum computer. Moreover, the patterns of electric charge in the island can’t be fully explained by current models of quantum physics, offering an opportunity to investigate rich new physical phenomena in materials.

This is the first time that researchers have probed the interior of a coupled quantum dot system so deeply, imaging the distribution of electrons with atomic resolution, noted NIST co-author Daniel Walkup. To take high-resolution images and spectra of the system, the team took advantage of a special relationship between the size of a quantum dot and the spacing of the energy levels occupied by the orbiting electrons: The smaller the dot, the greater the spacing, and the easier it is to distinguish between adjacent energy levels.

New method uses hydrogen plasma to smooth out wrinkles in graphene

Researchers from Nanjing University in China have developed a method to make large graphene films free of any wrinkles. The ultra-smooth films could enable large-scale production of electronic devices that harness the unique physical and chemical properties of graphene and other 2D materials.

Gao and his colleagues found that carefully harnessing protons during CVD can fully flatten the wrinkles. They used a method called plasma-enhanced CVD, in which reactive plasma is introduced into the growth chamber, allowing graphene growth at a lower temperature of 650 °C, an important step toward growing graphene directly on other substrates without having to transfer it.

Rice team transforms waste into graphene in a flash

A team of researchers at the Rice University lab of chemist James Tour has designed a ‘Green’ process that produces pristine graphene in bulk using waste food, plastic and other materials. According to the team, this process can help facilitate a reduction of the environmental impact of concrete and other building materials.

As reported in the study, flash graphene is made in 10 milliseconds by heating carbon-containing materials to 3,000 Kelvin (about 5,000 degrees Fahrenheit). The source material can be nearly anything with carbon content. Food waste, plastic waste, petroleum coke, coal, wood clippings and biochar are prime candidates, Tour said. “With the present commercial price of graphene being $67,000 to $200,000 per ton, the prospects for this process look superb,” he said.

UK-based rocket company Orbex develops graphene-enhanced rocket

Orbex, a UK-based private, low-cost orbital launch services company, has developed what it calls an "advanced, low carbon, high performance micro-launch" rocket called "Orbex Prime"

Built with 3D-printed engines and a carbon fiber-and-graphene body, Orbex Prime will utilize renewable "bio-propane" as its fuel of choice. The two-stage rocket will be designed to carry up to 150 kilograms of payload, contained within a 1.3-meter fairing, into Sun Synchronous Orbit. Orbex even says its Prime rocket will be "80% reusable", although it is rather unclear how this would be executed.

Meet the Graphene-Info team at MWC 2020

The Graphene-Info team is excited to announce its attendance at the Mobile World Congress 2020 on February 24-27 in Barcelona, Spain. The Mobile World Congress (MWC) is the world's largest gathering for the mobile industry, organized by the GSMA. It features a large exhibition, conference programme and networking opportunities.

For several years, the MWC event hosts a special graphene pavilion organized by the Graphene Flagship. This year, the Graphene Pavilion is promised to be even larger than before!

If you would like to set a meeting with us at MWC, please contact us!

Graphene-Info’s market reports - now updated editions!

Graphene-Info has published new versions of all its graphene market reports. Graphene-Info provides comprehensive niche graphene market reports, that cover everything you need to know about these niche markets. The reports are now updated to January 2020.

The reports include: the Graphene Batteries Market Report, the Graphene Supercapacitors Market Report, the Graphene Oxide Market Report, the Graphene for the Display and Lighting Industries and the Graphene Investment Guide.

A research team from the University of Göttingen, together with the Chemnitz University of Technology and the Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt Braunschweig, has investigated the influence of the crystal on which graphene is grown, on the electrical resistance of the resulting material.

Directa Plus has announced that it has received a grant for a project to develop an environmentally sustainable technology to digitally print its G+ graphene product on fabrics.

Directa Plus has signed an agreement with Comerio Ercole to pursue joint research and development projects using the company's G+ graphene technology.

Researchers at the India-based Central Mechanical Engineering Research Institute (CMERI) are developing an economical graphene-based supercapacitor that can present an effective alternative to providing energy to various applications, including state-of-the-art military equipment, mobile devices and modern vehicles.

Researchers of the Center for Multidimensional Carbon Materials (CMCM) within the Institute for Basic Science (IBS, South Korea), in collaboration with UNIST and Sungkyunkwan University teams, have reported the fabrication and use of single crystal copper-nickel alloy foil substrates for the growth of large-area, single crystal bilayer and trilayer graphene films.

India-based Log9 Materials believes that the key to better EVs is to focus on energy-generation, instead of energy storage.

Skeleton Technologies, European developer of graphene-based supercapacitors announced that it has signed a large-scale contract with Medcom to deploy its supercapacitors for Warsaw's Tram network.

XG Sciences announced the use of XG Sciences’ graphene in Grays’ field hockey sticks.

Graphene-Info lists 2019's top 10 graphene applications, ranked by the references at Graphene-Info