Graphene as an Open-Source Material

https://techcrunch.com/2019/06/13/graphene-as-an-open-source-material/

by sahin • 7 years ago

26 8 7 years ago

I remember long ago hearing about a cool graphene application getting patented by some public university out east. It made me really upset. There's so many awesome ideas coming out of public universities that never go anywhere due to IP hoarding.

It takes a lot of different people and perspectives to make something happen at scale. Keep these important ideas flowing and open!

AChamarthy• 7 years ago

I'm trying to connect with Don (author) - appreciate an intro if anyone has a good link.

mikeyouse• 7 years ago

I don't know him but his contact page lists a number of ways to get in touch: https://donbasile.com/contact/

mxcrossb• 7 years ago

Natural reserves of graphene are few and far between

This seems to imply that graphene does occasionally occur in nature? Does anyone know under what situations this happens?

ajmarcic• 7 years ago

Graphite is stacked and fragmented layers of graphene (search "graphene scotch tape"). It occurs naturally when carbon deposits are subjected to the right temperature and pressure. Meteorites, igneous, and metamorphic rock.

moneytide1• 7 years ago

The youtube channel of Robert-Murray Smith is a great resource for graphene experimentation, I recommend some of the older videos. He speaks in terms that a beginner chemist can understand.

Prompted me to buy some graphoil, sodium sulfate, and ultrasound sonication bath and follow along: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hFUOsZ0LSkQ

gene-h• 7 years ago

I don't exactly understand what the author means by open sourcing graphene. If they mean putting the methods used to produce and do things with graphene out there in the open, scientific journals are for the most part already doing this(although not all journals are open access). One can also copy whatever is in a patent as long as one doesn't attempt to sell it.

If the author is suggesting that amateurs do interesting work with graphene we run into a couple problems. It's difficult for amateurs to obtain even basic chemical reagents and labware. Most chemical suppliers won't even sell to amateurs. Not to mention that some of these chemicals involved can be pretty nasty. There's also the issue of all the equipment needed to evaluate stuff made with graphene. Microscopes and mechanical testers can be pretty expensive.

That being said graphene suffers from similar problems to other nanomaterials. While we can obtain high strength, we can only do so with close to atomically perfect sheets. We still don't have a good way to make large atomically perfect materials, so we can only achieve these high strengths with microscopic flakes of graphene. In addition, the roll to roll process they mentioned is still going to be pretty expensive. It's slow and energy intensive making it difficult to produce by the kilogram, much less the ton. It's also been noted that graphene really doesn't have much of a killer app[0], with most graphene applications being only marginally better than alternatives.

Now much of the hype around graphene came from it's electronic properties. The big attraction was that one could do many of the things we wanted to do with carbon nanotubes, that is making smaller faster transistors, using standard CMOS processing equipment[1]. The problem is that its still difficult to make graphene exhibit a band gap, which is important for making computer chips so that we can make transistors which actually turn off.

[0] https://www.nature.com/news/graphene-booms-in-factories-but-... [1] https://arxiv.org/pdf/0911.4685.pdf

bigger_cheese• 7 years ago

I experimented with Graphene as part of my engineering thesis at uni back in 2010. I was trying to synthesize anode materials for Li-Ion battery applications. The idea being graphene would better accommodate volume expansion during intercalation leading to better cycling performance of the battery.

I don't think there is any particular "secret sauce" in the technique I was using to make the graphene - I was using Modified Hummer's method (MH method) to make graphene-oxide and then reductive precipitation (RP) - it's well covered by the literature. There is even a wikipedia article on it.(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hummers%27_method). I don't think anything would really stop a dedicated amateur.

I agree with you a lot of the difficulty is sourcing the chemicals and especially the equipment (sonicator, centrifuge etc) which makes it much more suited for a laboratory than amateur experimentation. Also agree it's slow and time consuming to produce at least using method I was.

Graphene as an Open-Source Material

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