Now these days computers and electronics gadgets are important
part of human life, the lifestyle of people is being changed and according to
that we need things(gadgets) more portable and convenient which makes life
easy. For ease gadgets are being manufactured in a way that one can use it
wherever and whenever he/she want. Manufacturing companies are
doing continuous integration of the electronics.
In the way of integration a new element name GRAPHENE has
been discovered by scientist name Andre Geim and Konstantin and they
got Noble prize for that.
Graphene is a two-dimensional form of carbon. It is,
effectively, a single layer of graphite, and because it is just one atom
thick, it has some amazing properties, which have prompted speculation
that the days of silicon were numbered. However, those properties are easily
disrupted by impurities, which in turn are easily introduced, especially when
trying to grow graphene on a silicon substrate.
Graphene is most toughest and flexible element
ever discovered As the name is formed by graphite, isomer of carbon
so we can do fabrication on it. It is predicted that the fabrication
on graphene will be done on 2D i.e, every electronics item will be like a sheet
of paper, it seems very interesting that computer, phone, etc can be folded and
kept in pocket so it could make space elevators a reality As discussed earlier
that graphene is tough so nearly anything that needs to be strong and light
benefits from graphene.
The race to create ultra-thin transparent and
flexible electronic devices using graphene – the most conductive material known
to exist – has a promising new contender.
Ever since its discovery in 2004, graphene — the single layer of
carbon atoms flaked off from a piece of everyday graphite pencil — has been big
news. Among its many extraordinary properties is its conductivity, which at
about 100 times that of copper triggered much excitement about what the
material might do for electronics.
Researchers at MIT have built complex electronic components from
the graphene-like 2D form of molybdenum disulphide, or MoS2. MoS2 has been used
in industry for many years, but its 2D form was only characterized a
year or so ago.
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THE WONDER OF GRAPHENE
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Graphene is a single
atomic layer of carbon atoms bound in a hexagonal network.
Similar to another
important nanomaterial - carbon nanotubes - graphene is incredibly strong -
around 200 times stronger than structural steel.
A sheet as thin as
cling film can support an elephant.
It also conducts
electricity and heat better than any other known material.
It not only promises to
revolutionise semiconductor, sensor, and display technology, but could also
lead to breakthroughs in fundamental quantum physics research.
Scientists believe it
could one day be used to make transparent conducting materials, biomedical
sensors and even extremely light, yet strong, aircraft of the future.
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The trick is a
two-step technique. First, the graphene is grown on a copper substrate,
and then etched with conventional photolithography.Thenboron nitride is grown on the
etched areas using chemical vapour deposition.
According to the
announcement, Researchers were able to fabricate a variety of basic electronic
devices on the material: an inverter, which switches an input voltage to its
opposite; a NAND gate, a basic logic element that can be combined to carry
out almost any kind of logic operation; a memory device, one of the key
components of all computational devices; and a more complex circuit called a
ring oscillator, made up of 12 interconnected transistors, which can produce a
precisely-tuned wave output.
One potential
application is in flat screens for TVs and computer monitors, but Palacios sees
potential for a whole new range of applications, such as glowing walls of
light, or mobile phone antennae, etc.
that are incorporated into the material of the phone, or even woven into
fabric.
Graphene helps create artificial muscle that acts like the real
thing
One of the problems
facing the development of more realistic/natural acting robots is the
ability to create artificial muscles that mimic all aspects of the real thing.
Research currently being carried out at Nankai University has just taken a big
step closer to achieving that.
Silicene discovered: Single-layer silicon
that could beat graphene to market
Numerous research
groups around the world are reporting that they have created silicene, a one-atom-thick
hexagonal mesh of silicon atoms — the silicon equivalent of graphene.
Since its discovery a
few years ago, you will have heard a lot about graphene, especially with regard
to its truly wondrous electrical properties. Graphene is the most
conductive material in the known universe, and IBM has shown that graphene
transistors could be become the basis of transistors (and computers) that
operate in the hundreds-of-gigahertz or terahertz (THz) range. There’s only one
problem: Graphene isn't really a semiconductor in the
silicon/computer chip sense of the word. Unlike silicon (or
germanium), graphene doesn't have a band gap which
makes it very hard to actually build a switching device — such as a transistor
— out of it. Researchers have had some luck in introducing a band
gap but graphene is still a long way away from being used in current
silicon processes.
Silicene is more
exciting than graphene because, technically, it should be compatible with silicon-based electronics and
the huge, existing semiconductor fabrication processes.
In this case, each of
the research groups created a silicene sheet by condensing vaporized silicon on
a silver substrate. It’s theorized that silicene should have very desirable
electrical characteristics, similar to graphene, but for now we simply
have evidence that silicene exists (it has been observed with
a scanning tunneling electron microscope).
For further investigation of its properties, we need to grow
silicene on an insulator. No less than four research groups have recently grown
silicene on silver, though, so it’s fairly safe to assume that they’re now
working on an insulating substrate that’s amenable to silicon vapor deposition.
Considering no other semiconductor has really raised its head above silicon — a
material which will probably reach its physical limits in the next 3-5
years — it really would be handy if silicene turns out to be as miraculous
as graphene.
Read more at Physical Review Letters
