Electrically Conductive Plastic Polymer

AustinSlacker writes to mention Fox news is reporting that a Dutch researcher is announcing a breakthrough in plastics. A new way of rebuilding plastics could allow them to conduct electricity just as well as the silicon wafers currently used in electronic gadgets. "Prins discovered that in plastics, the movement of electric charges was mainly hindered by the shape of the polymer, the chain-like molecular structure [that is] the basis of each kind of plastic. Prins extended the work of a German group that had reshaped a polymer to form a ladder-like structures. By bombarding the specially developed plastic with electrons from a particle accelerator, she was able to study rapid electrical reactions and demonstrate the new plastic's ability to conduct electricity much better than regular plastic and as well as silicon chips."

Comments

As conductive as silicon?

[kmac06]

Silicon is not a good conductor. The advantage it can be doped to make it as good of a conductor as necessary (which also allows you to make transistors out of it). I doubt this plastic can be doped...

Also, why not run a test current through it to measure the conductivity instead of using an accelerator?

Re:as well as silicon?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why dont you take a look at how silicon wafers for microchip production, and how solar panels are produced, and just how environmentally hostile it is.

Or just bloviate with your 8th grade knowledge of science.

Carbon and Oxygen are everywhere too! Why all the crying about CO2 in the atmostphere?