Graphene science | Mikael Fogelström | TEDxGöteborg

I am becoming more and more curious as to whether the TEDx events in countries other than America are all conducted in English.

If so, that's both awesome for us English-only speakers and kind of dismissive of those non-American countries. I'm just saying. (I'm also incredibly impressed by multi-lingual people.)

"Graphene is the material of superlatives."

That's a fine description of graphene - and also a not useful description. It's the most stable, strongest, best electrical and thermal conductor, transparentest, impermeable material around. That's interesting, but until I start to see graphene actually being used to make something I use better, I'm holding back on my excitement for what graphene actually can do for us. 

It's theoretically neat and experimentally cool, but it's only theoretically useful for now.

Yes, there might one day be transparent electronics, remarkably strong but lightweight composites for airplanes, better batteries and capacitors for electric vehicles, instantaneous DNA sequencing (as the video shows at 7:30)...maybe...

(I do warn you that this video is a little less exciting as far as TED presentations go. The ideas are amazing and theoretically world-changing, but the speaker is - in his at least second language - less dynamic than he could be.)

The wonder material of the 21st century | Monica Cracuin & Dimitar Dimov | TEDxTruro

No, I have never wondered why pushing harder on a pencil while I'm writing makes the line darker.

I just assumed that there were more layers of graphite being left behind.

Oh, wait, that's it?

Wow. that's not a great opening question, Dimitar.

Here Dimitar discusses the benefits of adding graphene to concrete to make the concrete even stronger. Then Professor Cracuin steps in and suggests other uses of graphene - electronics integrated into fabrics or even our skin - and graphene-like materials (?). She mentions a material of two layers of graphene sandwiched around iron chloride (a combination she calls graphexeter - after the University of Exeter where she researches) to make incredibly flexible, durable, conductive displays - possibly even 'tatoo'ed onto the skin or integrated into contact lenses.

As an aside, I think this is the first TED talk I've seen that switches presenters partway through.

Why graphene hasn't taken over the world...yet

As long as they don't make ropes of graphene and have a 200,000-person tug of war, I'm all good with most uses of graphene.

The idea of mixing graphene in with ink and printing circuits on fabric seems pretty outstanding to me. I love the image of clothing that could include its own circuitry and would be fully durable no matter how we treat it.

Adding A Funny Form Of Carbon To Silly Putty Creates A Heart Monitor

Silly putty is apparently miraculous.

It doesn't walk down stairs - along or in pairs. It doesn't roll over your neighbor's dog.

But it does appear to be usable as a pressure sensor when graphene is added to it. The graphene turns the silly putty into a conductive mass, the precise conductivity of which is highly sensitive to changes in pressure - to the point where it can be used to monitor the blood pressure and pulse in the carotid artery.

Source - NPR and Science

Slicing ice with your fingers (and a bit of graphene)

The 'knife' can't possibly be a single layer of carbon atoms, right? I can see the 'knife', so it clearly must be more than one atom thick (as the video says at 0:55, it's a quarter of an inch thick.)

How is it, then, graphene? Is graphene truly graphene is it's multiple layers thick?

Graphene is one layer thick, but if you stack those multiple layers, don't you get good ol' graphite?

Is graphene really that awesome a conductor of heat? Apparently, yeah.

10 mind-blowing man-made materials

Admit it, you're every bit as susceptible to list videos (and internet posts) as I am.

We all must be, otherwise we'd probably lose a third of the internet and be left with just cat videos and pictures of pretty people.

This video is severely lacking in detail for each of the "ten mind-blowing man-made materials", but it would be a great starting point to get your class thinking about the Materials Choice Award.

Bulletproof graphene makes ultra-strong body armor

 
That title, from a New Scientist article, might be over-selling things at this stage of development.

Lee and colleagues ... used a laser pulse to superheat gold filaments until they vaporised, acting like gunpowder to fire a micrometre-size glass bullet into 10 to 100 sheets of graphene at 3 kilometres per second – about three times the speed of a bullet fired from an M16 rifle.

That's pretty far from actually having a product in development.

It's sort of like saying that I can take a few steps in my back yard and announcing that I've walked on the moon.

Well, maybe that's a little exaggeration because graphene is amazing stuff.

What is graphene? Here's what you need to know about a material that could be the next silicon?

Sure, 'the next silicon.'

We've heard that before, and I'm guessing we'll hear that again.

First there was Bruce Springsteen. He was going to be the next silicon. Never panned out.

Then there was Kobe Bryant. He was going to be the next silicon. Never panned out.

Graphene might be the next silicon with a little more research, but until it is the next silicon, let's hold back that phrase a little bit, can we, please?

Until it either does or doesn't pan out, let's see if we can learn a little bit about graphene just in case.

(Here's another nice introduction to graphene, this from CNN.)

PS: Bruce Springsteen was going to the next Bob Dylan. Kobe Bryant was supposed to be the next Michael Jordan.

The Super Supercapacitor | Brian Golden Davis

The eureka moment described here feels a whole lot like the moment in Primer where Abe slides the car batteries out of the way. (What do you mean, you haven't seen Primer yet? Close this window and go watch it immediately.)

Batteries work...sort of...

Capacitors - specifically supercapicitors - may, however, just end up being a far more effective means of energy storage, something that we are desperately in need of as we make the - hopeful - shift from fossil fuels to renewables, some of which (solar, wind) are very much problematic in their ability to provide round the clock energy production.

Could capacitors be the solution?

One box of Girl Scout cookies worth $15 billion

As a chemistry teacher, hearing the quote "carbon is carbon" about 1:20 into this video just made my day.

In the video researchers from Rice University Labs turn girl scout cookies - trefoils from what I can tell - into graphene on copper, and the girl scout troop then performs some simple tests on the graphene sheet, clearly testing the conductivity (or resistance, maybe) of the product.