Slashdot Mirror
Graphene Conducts Electricity Ten Times Better Than Expected
ananyo writes "Physicists have produced nanoribbons of graphene — the single-atom-thick carbon — that conduct electrons better than theory predicted even for the most idealized form of the material (abstract). The finding could help graphene realize its promise in high-end electronics, where researchers have long hoped it could outperform traditional materials such as silicon. In graphene, electrons can move faster than in any other material at room temperature. But techniques that cut sheets of graphene into the narrow ribbons needed to form wires of a nano-scale circuit leave ragged edges, which disrupt the electron flow. Now a team led by physicist Walt de Heer at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta has made ribbons that conduct electric charges for more than 10 micrometres without meeting resistance — 1,000 times farther than in typical graphene nanoribbons. The ribbons made by de Heer's team in fact conduct electrons ten times better than standard theories of electron transport they should, say the authors."
While it is interesting to see the advances with graphene, if used to make super fast computers, isn't the "wiring" on the chip only a small part of the problem? Have they found a way to make the transistors and resistors and parts on the chip out of graphene? If not, wouldn't the speed improvements be nonexistent? It would seem that it would be like taking a super highway and bringing all the traffic down to one lane at the exits (or maybe a bridge in NJ).
I feel the loss of the comment threads as much as you jellomizer. Which is exactly what this whole thing is about. The new site model nukes the existing message board structure.
Rather than see these as off topic posts, spamming the message boards, try the perspective that there is only one topic until this issue is resolved to the communities satisfaction and that these comments are in fact using the message boards for their intended purpose: maintaining a moderated discussion guided by the consensus generated by the readership.
These posts have become the most effective manner of communicating to the correct authority. The correct authority in this case is the broad readership, some of whom are just learning about this. The other authority is the controlling entities who have thus far made some poor choices about not responding to the communities posts in the designated channels. Therefore this is the next step in a spectrum of responses.
I personally apologize to you for the necessity of this step which has been provoked by the site operators. I do hope things change quickly, since I love slashdot. I am slashdot.
Graphene has very high conductivity for what it is: a monoatomic layer. This is important in ICs where certain material thicknesses are in the nanometres. Also graphene has a very specific and uniform thickness, which solves uniformity problem when trying to deposit 1 nm material uniformly across 300 mm wafers. But when you can afford to increase the thickness (in macroscopic systems), metals become much more conductive than "macroscopic grahene," which is just regular graphite and is not so conductive. Actually graphite is used as electronic resistors and in certain heater elements (as it is conductive enough to pass large currents, but resistive enough to heat a lot by Joule effect and finally stands very well high temperatures).
An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Fuck beta now, or be fucked by it forever.
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
I can assure you it's not the same AC over and over because AC comments are throttled by IP address.
However, if slashdot dies because of this, it won't be because of Dice. It will be because like the dinosaurs, we couldn't adapt.
Why should we have to adapt to garbage? I don't think anyone would refuse to adapt to a new paint scheme, it's the fact that the new site is fundamentally and functionally broken by design. The fact that dice felt now was a good time to start forcing users to something so broken shows that they have a fundamental misunderstanding of what this place is about. It's not that the beta site is a little buggy, it's that it is completely broken.
At the very least they should have waited until commenting was at functional parity before revealing their hand but now it's too late, they have revealed the direction of things to come and it does not bode well for the future of the slashdot.org domain.
I, for one, am looking forward to the inevitable
For people who claim that science is wrong/bad/not complete - this is the kind of thing that research and study can do.
The expected result was off by 10x. This doesn't mean that science sucks - but rather there is a new question to be answered that will allow us to understand the world just a little bit better.
AWESOME.
Yeah, Beta is like world destroying comet, and we the inhabitants of that world.
The real question is, in what way does the fucking beta make slashdot better? Just take one example, the ridiculous amount of whitespace around posts. That's millions of monitors burning electricity displaying absolutely nothing. Secondly, because so little information is displayed, there will be a lot more scrolling required. That will contribute to wrist and elbow problems for those who don't yet have them, and for people like me who do, aggravate them.
Fucking beta is killing the planet and it's bad for your health. So yeah -- dinos like me are gonna bitch. Suck it up.
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
The fast majority of the F*ck Beta comments are coming from ACs. For all we know that could be a single individual or even a bot.
No, actually, I've been surprised by the number of real posts here against the beta, some of them with some incredibly low UID's. Much as I hate the beta, even I never expected such an overwhelming response (and, believe me, I've been around here a lot longer than my UID would indicate).
The cow says "Moo." The dog says "Woof." The Timothy says "Thanks, valued customer. We appreciate your input."
These comments are Slashdot's response. The management-speak in the Beta article is Dice's. They made it perfectly clear that, even after all this backlash, Classic will soon be gone:
Most importantly, we want you to know that Classic Slashdot isn't going away until we're confident that the new site is ready.
I, too, am here for the intelligent discussion. So I do apologize. But Dice ignores our complaints, while pretending to listen. Ruining every single discussion is the only option we have left.
Try using bold or italics or posting a link. Try to find the URL of a comment. Log off and try to log back in, I couldn't log in at work (they use IE7).
No, they added nothing of value and removed much of value. Does Microsoft own Dice?
Free Martian Whores!
It's not a mere redesign, it's a fundamental change in the way slashdot works by changing what slashdot is all about. They should have waited until things actually worked before revealing the beta, but as it is, by forcing users to the fundamentally broken beta site they've shown that they no longer care about the community.
Forcing users to a completely unusable site shows nothing but contempt for the users.
I, for one, am looking forward to the inevitable
Hey slashdot, keep the javascript-free version.
It's been decades since I took solid state physics courses, but here's what I remember.
Conducting solid, like metal, is modeled as a single monolithic entity as opposed to a set of individual elemental atoms. Each atom's high(est) energy electrons become "free" electrons that can move about the whole solid with minimum provocation (i.e., voltage). So when electric field or voltage is applied across the solid, these free electrons bunch up towards positive charge - i.e. the "skin" you referred to.
Because, you know, electrons have a negative charge. Haha.
So when voltage is applied to the solid, and there is a route out of the solid towards positive charge, the free electrons will move that way. If there is also a route into the solid through which new (to the solid) electrons move in, then you have a circuit where electrons flow in and out of the solid (as you say) along the skin, and hence you have current.
That's what I remember of the simple version of solid state model that look at solid's free electrons as a group. Because the free electrons are treated as a group, it doesn't deal with whether the electron that just popped out are new (to the solid) one or the last one in line - the model doesn't give individuality to each electrons.
Not sure it answers your question adequately, but that's what popped into my head. Maybe others will do a more proper job.
Like I was saying, KEEP THE JAVASCRIPT-FREE SLASHDOT, you dirtbags! :-)
Fuck systemd. Fuck Redhat. Fuck Soylent, too. Wait, scratch the last one.