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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."
conductive plastic actually has some uses, but being a larger molecule than molecular silicon or germanium, doesn't make it look like the next New Chip Substrate.
if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?
The real benefit is things renewed potential for things like sensors, and smart clothing.
Maybe it will make short but wide networks possible, who knows.
I think mostly though, that it could be used to replace the small electronic devices that get used everyday that you don't think of from a techies perspective. Automotive pieces certain types of switches, small controllers, toys, medical devices, spoilage detectors for food/ food processing etc. These would be the key industries I can think of off the bat
How much is your data worth? Back it up now.
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?
Ok, so in the last couple years or so we've seen the devlopment of: 1) electrically conductive plastics 2) transparent (when off) OLED-based displays, 3) transparent plastic-based circuits, 4) clear plastic-based batteries, 5) multitouch input capability, and 6) light-based data transfer methods and holographic data storage.
Within 10 years I hope to see all of these technologies combined into a geek fantasy device: a clear plastic tablet computer about the size of a pad of paper. Not to mention the hojillion other applications that suddenly become possible when you can embed a complete computer with I/O in a transparent medium: HUDs for glasses, store windows that are also dynamic advertising surfaces, image processing and data overlay on windshields (e.g. thermal or IR image data to augment the scene in poor visibility), etc.
I especially like the plastic battery concept since in theory you could make certain structural elements also function as you battery so there is no need for a bulky power source attached to the device, this would work well for the glasses display - the frames themselves could be the battery and/or processor. Although we'd definitely want to make sure there aren't any exploding battery incidents like with recent laptops.
-- I'm not a pessimist, I'm a realist. It's not my fault that life sucks so much. --
actually, polymers are inherently more flexible than other plastics. this may actually make some products more durable. think of it this way: glass = silicon, rubber = polymer. which one breaks easier?
this misses the point entirely though, the main advantage is that the manufacturing process would be theoretically less expensive. much of the cost and difficulty with silicon chips today is involved with the manufacture/conditioning of the silicon wafers. plastics are very cheap these days.
If this type of plastic can be a conductive substance similar to silicon and costs less to produce, then this could be a huge advantage to those advocating the use of solar power. Currently one of the largest costs in creating solar cells is the high price for silicon which is used in them. The use of a cheap plastic polymer with properties similar to silicon might make solar cells much more reasonable to purchase for a lot of people.
If you had a choice between using a particle accelerator or a power supply, which would you use?
I hope to convince my office to move to the grounds of fermi lab, so I can have the choice as well.
Just have to remember to switch to conventional power supply before they start the experiments with anti matter.
Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
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?
So I get the sensation that just like everywhere else on Slashdot, a lot of people are out of their depth when it comes to this topic. For some background, might I suggest reading about the work of the three men who shared the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2000 for their work in conductive polymers. These materials are incredible in a myriad of ways, but require a nontrivial understanding of materials to really get it.