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Graphene Super Paper Is 10x Stronger Than Steel
Elliot Chang writes "The University of Technology in Sydney recently unveiled a new type of graphene nano paper that is ten times stronger than a sheet of steel. Composed of processed and pressed graphite, the material is as thin as a sheet of paper yet incredible durable — this strength and thinness gives it remarkable applications in many industries, and it is completely recyclable to boot."
Apparently the pencil is now mightier than the sword.
My understanding is that pure carbon things sublimate into CO2 over time (including diamonds) when exposed to oxygen.
Just out of curiosity, anyone have an idea about the life of these sorts of materials? I'd think that a very thin, sublimating material with large surface area wouldn't last very long.
while(1) attack(People.Sandy);
No chance your dog eats your homework now.
Note that this only refers to tensile strength.
How can I believe you when you tell me what I don't want to hear?
Here is the stress strain graph.
10x stronger than steel in what aspect? Malleability, ductilibility, toughness, or all the above?
Life is not for the lazy.
Can it give Superman a paper cut?
If they could not make it transparent, it would be really revolutionary. Considering it's "just" carbon, it does have that potential...
As somebody working with graphene and having read the paper; IMHO this can be improved even further by improving the micro-structure of the material (less defects). Less defects could prolly be achieved by annealing at a higher temperature (in vacuum or argon). Also irradiation with high energy ions could be useful in improving the interlocking of the graphene layers.
Of course higher annealing temperature would make the material more expensive.
All some bright fool needs to do is figure out a way to glue it together like cardboard, and we'll never be able to get our parcels open!
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
"it’s two times as hard, six times lighter and ten times higher in tensile strength"
Well, to the materials scientists I work with, those words sound like advertising more than useful information.
Two times as hard as steel. Steel in what condition? There is a very wide variety of steel alloys, and these can be heat treated to be as whatever hardness is necessary. Find a piece of mild steel (the kind of stuff you might find at the hardware store) and try to scratch it with something hard. You can scratch it pretty easily, but try again on a piece of stainless steel cutlery and you'll probably find it quite a bit more difficult. Both are steel.
Six times lighter. Per unit volume? Ok, but how do the other characteristics compare given the same volume? Or given the same weight? The article doesn't give any real detail or any frame of reference.
Ten times higher in tensile strength - again, if you want to compare to steel you need to give the alloy grade (grade refers to composition, not quality), and the heat treatment - anyone who's bought nuts and bolts at the hardware store has noticed that these metal items are available in different strength grades even within the same basic metal family.
Those claims sound just like those given for aluminum - it's lighter (per unit volume), stronger (per unit weight), etc. But, in service, where toughness (ie. impact resistance, the ability to deform plastically before fracturing, etc), steel beats aluminum hands down.
Not that I'm a big fan of steel or anything, it's just that these comparisons are often incomplete and therefore meaningless. It's too bad the article writer didn't include any actual mechanical property values.
Putting moderation advice in your
bullet, if the bullet is fired from a WWII period carbine with standard powder load. More powerful than a locomotive, specifically an R100 with a half-load of diesel traveling on level ground, with standard moisture conditions. Able to leap tall buildings, that is any vertical structure with a height of 2,000 meters or less, in a single bound, a bound beind defined as a vertical motion impelled by a single push of the foot against the earth, being level with the first floor of the building's entrance, and also considering stable wind conditions, standard humidity, temperature, and pressure, and no precipitation.
actually, if you think about it, this FINALLY makes the game make sense.
who knows what the shearing force resistance of this new stuff is, common scissors may still be able to cut through it. on the other hand, there is finally a good reason why your average rock can't just rip through the center of it, which was always the weak point of the traditional rock-paper-scissors. there was never a good reason that paper could withstand rock. if there was, any houses at the base of mountains or volcanoes would be made out of paper.
Steel is the most recycled material on the planet. It is also plenty strong for most applications. So my question is, how much does this super-nano-paper cost? That will be key in its success.
Steel was once incredibly expensive, a rarity only kings/warlords possessed. Aluminum was once so expensive it was mainly used in the luxury goods of the rich. I think the key to success is usefulness. Cost has more to do with how quickly that success occurs.
Graphene is a single sheet of carbon -> this material starts off as graphite, and ends up as graphite. Despite the fancy processing and techniques they have devised, the sample is the thickness of paper, not the thickness of a monolayer of carbon atoms.
The thing here is that the graphene layers are interconnected by covalent bonds. This improves the mechanical properties because the graphene planes can not slip and slide on each other as a result of strain on the sample.
Perfectly timed, I must say.
While cost obviously *is* a factor in any material's success, I disagree that it has to be cheap relative to steel to be successful. A material doesn't have to be cheaper in *every* application than anything else to be successful. It need only solve a problem *within a certain set of valuable constraints* more cheaply than anything else.
Steel's remarkable versatility and cheapness makes it seem like a universal material, but we already have successful materials that are "stronger than steel" by various measures. They don't have to be cheaper than steel or displace steel in every application to be useful. We use materials like carbon fiber for properties they offer that steel cannot match at any price. That's why you'll see carbon fiber in aircraft but not bridge members. It's *economical* to use it in aircraft where you can because the weight savings is well worth the price. Likewise the ability to cheaply fabricate lightweight, corrosion resistant, elaborately shaped pieces of fiberglass makes it a great material for boat hulls, but for railroad cars a steel box with some paint slapped on is more economical.
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Also, why would he ever 'leap' if he can fly?
-- The reader anything less than completely failing to not misunderstand this sig is cursed.
Originally, he couldn't fly. In some of the earliest Superman cartoons he's seen not flying, just jumping very very far. Like the Hulk does. A few episodes later in, what I think is the same season of the same show, he is seen flying.
Jet fighters are made of carbon fibre, so swapping one form of carbon for another isn't going to increase any risks. Swapping for a stronger carbon may allow for a lighter frame, though. The drawback is that graphene is a semiconductor and fighters travel at a high enough altitude that there are potential risks of some interesting side-effects.
Now, Formula 1 cars are also made of plastic-reinforced carbon fibre. It is always a great challenge to the teams to build cars that are as light as possible and yet capable of meeting safety requirements that are unimaginably stringent. (I doubt there's a single road car that could handle 250 tonne impacts.) Depending on exactly what directions graphene paper can absorb stresses, it's possible that you could devise much lighter cars that also offer superior protection against those unwanted 240mph collisions. Lacking high levels of cosmic radiation or fly-by-wire controls, F1 cars are also much less likely to suffer any ill-effects from unwanted graphene properties.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
Do you understand the concept of "summary"? If this were a blog about materials engineering, I might agree with you that such detail is needed. As it is, most people here probably read the summary, thought, "Cool!" and continued reading other articles. Had they had more detailed information, they would have read the summary, thought, "Um... Okay..." and continued reading other articles.
If you're counting on Slashdot to give you detailed technical information in its summaries, perhaps you're reading the wrong blog. If you happen to be a materials engineer and want more detailed technical information, well, that's what TFA is for. The article, which, incidentally, is actually yet another summary of another article from the University of Technology in Sydney, which is a summary of an article in the Journal of Applied Physics, which in turn is a summary of probably a very detailed thesis or dissertation backed by metric craptons of research data by Ali R. Ranjbartoreh, Bei Wang, Xiaoping Shen, and Guoxiu Wang.
See how it works? You start with "10 times stronger!" and it's up to you to dig as deeply as you want to in order to find the level of technical detail and/or interest that suits you. Personally, given that I'm not a materials engineer and that "10 times stronger!" is good enough to suit my level of interest and make me say, "Cool!", I'm actually glad that more technical details were not provided.