Graphene Super Paper Is 10x Stronger Than Steel 244
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."
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I always hate "stronger". What does it mean? Tensile strength? Compression? What metric are they claiming "10 times stronger".
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OR couldn't agree more.
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Also, it can be used in temperatures two times lower than paper.
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It has a nasty stink?
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Graphene offers many advantages over steel – it’s two times as hard, six times lighter and ten times higher in tensile strength.
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Then put it in the summary. When I see such a liteweight summary in scientifc terms, I don't bother to read on. I get innudated with tons of "information" and can only be arsed to read on if I have confidence in the value of what I am going to read.
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I think it took you longer to write that post than it would have to actually RTFA.
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Summary (Score:5, Insightful)
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 [uts.edu.au] from the University of Technology in Sydney, which is a summary of an article [aip.org] 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.
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but something that thin, I wonder what the shearing force it can withstand is.
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Shearing force is basically just tensile force acting on a very short segment of the material.
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but that "very short segment" part truly matters.
I'm a decently strong guy, but I can't rip apart even a fairly thin sheet of something like aluminum (no, not aluminum foil, real sheet metal). I can cut through it with ease with even a moderate pair of scissors though.
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but that "very short segment" part truly matters.
A material which performs well under tension also tends to convert shear into tensile forces and transmit those tensile forces throughout its length, unless there's some good reason why it can't.
I can't rip apart even a fairly thin sheet of something like aluminum (no, not aluminum foil, real sheet metal). I can cut through it with ease with even a moderate pair of scissors though.
Keep in mind that you're using a set of levers to greatly multiply your force.
Those terms are meaningless (Score:5, Interesting)
"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.
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Its a short blurb in a web site that is devoted to design. If you put specific measurements with units in this article, you will confuse the shit out of your readers, and interest them not at all. Just take a look at the page with the editors and writers... they're not exactly scientists.
I agree that it's not very useful for materials nerds, but this is a way of ensuring that this material can be taken up in application. They can always look up the details if they really need them. In that way, the arti
Superman! Faster, longitudinally, than a speeding (Score:5, Funny)
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.
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Able to leap tall buildings, that is any vertical structure with a height of 2,000 meters or less
Not much of a limitation. That's more than twice the height of the Burj Khalifa.
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Speaking of swords, could this finally make giant anime swords a real possibility? Attempts with less exotic materials have had very limited success. [youtube.com]
Re:The Strength of Compressed Graphite? (Score:4, Informative)
Attempts with less exotic materials have had very limited success.
The biggest problem there is, the user has no clue what he's doing. Large swords are never used as swords (swinging/slashing). That's a complete misconception. Large swords are actually used as a pole arm (thus the typical handhold north of the hilt) and frequently used from horseback where the extra reach is desired. Furthermore, should one actually desire to use it standing and not as a pole arm, you would do so in a spinning/slicing fashion rather than a swinging manner - but that would be a move or pure desperation.
Remember, not all swords are used the same. For example, the classic Roman sword, central to the phalanx [wikipedia.org], was almost never used in a swinging fashion; despite being bladed. It was almost exclusively used in a shielded, stabbing technique.
In fact, contrary to pop culture, the sword was pretty far down on the list of preferred weapons. Universally, weapons such as spears, pikes, flails, mace, pole arms, axes and hammers of various sizes were, by far, the preferred weapons. Swords, if in fact they were used at all, were considered a weapon of last resort. And in fact, long daggers/short swords where typically preferred over that of what is typically depicted as a sword in pop culture. Which in turn, is precisely what inspired the creation of weapons such as bastard (sword and a half)/long sword, and two handed swords (example, claymore).
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When I read the subject of your post, my next thought was "Able to leap tall buildings in a single bound..."
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Rate of degrading? (Score:4, Interesting)
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.
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Not generally. It sublimates at 3915K, the highest of all elements. Additionally, it's very non-reactive in most forms around standard temperature and pressure. Stable carbon forms do *not* oxidize easily.
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Would it be impossible to coat it with some kind of varnish? Say, like they already do to avoid metal sheets from oxidizing...
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Also, this may be ten times stronger than steel, but it is still carbon, which makes it ten times more combustible than steel as well.
Re:Rate of degrading? (Score:5, Insightful)
Also, this may be ten times stronger than steel, but it is still carbon, which makes it ten times more combustible than steel as well.
Sort of like diamonds are ten times more combustible than steel wool.
I don't think it's quite that simple...
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So you wouldn't want to build an airplane or a building out of it... but useful in undersea and outer space applications I bet.
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My understanding is that pure carbon things sublimate into CO2 over time.
{img src="Inigo Montoya.gif"}
Re:Rate of degrading? (Score:4, Informative)
My understanding is that pure carbon things sublimate into CO2 over time (including diamonds) when exposed to oxygen.
I don't disagree that this might happen, but isn't this usually called oxidation and not sublimation? Sublimation refers to a state change (always C), and oxidation is a chemical reaction (C to CO2). If oxidation happens quickly enough, I heard it is called "burning"...
(ducks)
At any rate, you are partially correct in that diamond oxidation depends on sublimation occurring:
http://acs.omnibooksonline.com/data/papers/2001_6.2.pdf [omnibooksonline.com]
But you may need to heat it to 350 degrees C for this to happen at a noticeable rate:
http://www.mdu.edu.tw/Chinese/pdf/mdu01c-2-09.pdf [mdu.edu.tw]
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Graphite is very similar to diamond in this. Technically the reaction is favorable but the kinetics don't work..... then again, I'm an idiot.....
#1 excuse gone.. (Score:3, Funny)
No chance your dog eats your homework now.
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Nah, better yet... the dog ate my homework AND I had to take him to the vet because he was not crapping!
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Pfft, easy. My *robot dog* ate my homework.
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1. get some magnesium sulfate
2. get some water
3. mix the magnesium sulfate and water
4. get a funnel
5. stick funnel into dog's mouth
6. pour magnesium sulfate solution down dog's throat
7. wait
8. get some tongs or gloves
9. retrieve paper
It's a longer list than you're used to seeing, and there's no "profit". There's also no "???", so I think that makes up or it.
"Ten times stronger than steel" (Score:4, Interesting)
Note that this only refers to tensile strength. [xkcd.com]
Re:"Ten times stronger than steel" (Score:5, Funny)
Re:"Ten times stronger than steel" (Score:5, Funny)
God, is there an internet rule that states that for any reasonably technical topic that there will be an xkcd comic for it? =)
There is now...
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I was there when afidel's law was born. Waiting for a thread to be afideled.
~Loyal
Re:"Ten times stronger than steel" (Score:5, Funny)
Yes. It's called the Munroe Doctrine.
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Tensile strength is ten times stronger. (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Tensile strength is ten times stronger. (Score:5, Informative)
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Access to this article requires a subscription or AIP Article Pack, or rent it for $3.99
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For those of us not in the materials field, can you provide a short explanation?
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For measuring the strength of materials, the stress strain curve shows the amount of stress as a function of strain. Essentially, it shows how much force per cross sectional area (pressure) the material can handle as it stretches. This isn't quite as simple as it sounds because the cross sectional area decreases as a function of strain too. This is known as Poisson's ratio.
Here is the wikipedia [wikipedia.org]
That part is easy. The part I couldn't understand is what each of the different lines represents. Sorry, didn't find G-ODA(1) vs. G-ODA(2) to be terribly informative (and it has been too long since my engineering classes to recall what the stress-strain curve for steel looks like, so not terribly useful without a directly comparable diagram for at least some form of steel).
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10x stronger by weight, by volume, what?
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Strength is measured in Pascals (i.e. it is a pressure).
Since we do not FTFM! (Score:2)
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FTFA:
"Graphene offers many advantages over steel â" itâ(TM)s two times as hard, six times lighter and ten times higher in tensile strength."
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When they're comparing graphene to steel, they always mean tensile strength. Hope this helps.
Work it harder, make it better! (Score:2)
"Harder, better, faster, stronger
N-n-now that that don't kill me can only make me stronger!"
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None of those properties are "strength".
When you compare to steel, it's almost always tensile strength.
from the is-there-anything-it-can't-do dept... (Score:3)
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Yes, but not Chuck Norris.
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Bruce Lee is dead and he can STILL kick Chuck Norris's* ass from beyond the grave.
*What the rule for the possive plural when someones name ends in S?
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I want to know if a Ginsu knife will cut it and a tomato with the same ease.
[Gee, I'm old... now get off my lawn!]
How does this compare to aluminium? (Score:2)
Aluminium is 3x lighter than steel.
If this material is 10x lighter than steel we would be able to build among others much lighter aircraft.
Of course, I hope we don't have to glue the plane together from A4 sized pieces of "paper".
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Before you going making planes out of it, find out how it handles repeated stresses. No need to build more 737s that have moon-roofs.
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Of course, I hope we don't have to glue the plane together from A4 sized pieces of "paper".
Well, I hope you never travel in a Boeing 787.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_(fiber) [wikipedia.org]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_fiber_reinforced_plastic#Composite [wikipedia.org]
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As someone pointed out earlier, it is still carbon. Building a plane out of coal will make for interesting-to-contain fires at disaster sites after crashes.
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Stop posting and talking. seriously, just stop. Open up some science books and read.
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glue the plane together from A4 sized pieces of "paper"
Haven't you heard of Origami?
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There is more to a material than it's tensile strength. Failure modes, amount of plasticity before failure, compressive strength and many other factors are important.
For example, one of the reasons high strength concrete isn't used very often is that it's failure mode is instantaneous (rather dramatic too) rather than crumbly. As a result there is no warning when it fails whereas regular concrete begins to crumble and drop debris, a very visible and noticeable sign of failure allowing time to evacuate.
So wh
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If only there was an article that list the other properties to some degree.
Fighters, maybe. F1... more likely. (Score:3)
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
a statement without context (Score:2)
has no meaning
spider silk is also stronger than steel. meaning what? give us the actual conditions under which the statement is rendered, and stop pushing the science lite for idiots
Now, make it transparent... (Score:3)
If they could not make it transparent, it would be really revolutionary. Considering it's "just" carbon, it does have that potential...
This can probably be improved further (Score:4, Interesting)
Of course higher annealing temperature would make the material more expensive.
'Stronger' is a prett general term (Score:2)
Malleability, Ductility, Tensile strength, Hardness, Abrasion resistance, Brittleness, Thermal conductivity, Thermal coefficient of expansion... they mention some of these, but the list goes on quite a ways.
It might be nice and light and easy to cover an airplane with, but if the plane hits a pebble on takeoff will it shatter a wing because it's really brittle? If same plane soaks up a bunch of rays sitting on the tarmac in 110F deg heat, does the stuff expand by a factor of 10? Likewise, when it gets to 40
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Now (Score:4, Funny)
darn (Score:2)
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Good. D not want a space elevator. When it comes down, and everything does, it will be disastrous on a global scale.
Wet Paper Bag (Score:2)
Finally -- the answer to those tough guys who say that I can't punch my way out of a wet paper bag!
Who can't punch their way out of a wet paper bag now, tough guy?
Rearden Metal? (Score:2)
Housing? (Score:2)
Obviously if it can be made durable enough it might be a wonderful housing material. A cardboard like wall of this stuff might mean the end of wind storms destroying walls and roofs. It also sounds rather ideal for car and truck skins. And a new trombone made of this stuff might also be very interesting. Trurning a 2.5 lb. musical instrument into a three oz. instrument that resist destruction would be a blessing.
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Tensile strength of the material isn't what destroys homes in wind storms. It's the horizontal force applied by the wind which shears the structural material from it's fasteners (in this case the plywood shears the nails). For roofs there are two failure modes, either the roof decking has enough uplift to pull the roofing nails or the entire roof truss is sheared off the wall connections.
Having a material with ten times the tensile strength of steel isn't going to stop wind from tearing walls and roofs off
Superman... (Score:2)
...the man of Graphene Paper!
Hmm... somehow it doesn't have the same ring...
hazmat? (Score:2)
Sounds like it has great physical properties, but what about potential hazards? What happens when it burns or is crushed/shredded? Does it burn violently or excessively hot (or cold)? Is the smoke toxic? In mutilated form, does it release toxic or otherwise hazardous particles? Can you handle it with bare hands, and can you handle a torn edge with bare hands? Can it be disposed of normally? What about resistance to solvents and/or petroleum?
If the stuff is hazardous, then it's going to have some seve
Bicycles? (Score:2)
How long until we see bicycle frames manufactured out of graphene? Stronger and lighter than steel? If it has reasonable durability and flex qualities then I'm looking forward to it.
Commercial paper planes!!! (Score:2)
Think of all the uses. Paper hardhats. Unbreakable contracts. Toilet paper that doesn't tear, for really serious <censored>'s.
Awsome! =)
Strong enough to make a tape to Geosync orbit? (Score:2)
10x stronger than steel sounds great even if it is just tensile strength because tensile strength is what is needed to go to Geosync orbit right? Then with the right solar/laser powered "climber" we have our space elevator right?
I have no idea how many orders of magnitude improvement are needed but I am happy that at least this stuff is being made in macroscopic quantities. (I mean there's an actual PICTURE of it being held by some forceps! Not like the tiny lengths of nanotubes I've heard about).
By the
Re:The implications of this are staggering (Score:4, Interesting)
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.
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Graphite is one of cheaper forms of carbon to obtain.
Graphene is created by stripping thin layers off graphite.
Of course to combine them into something of reasonable strength, you need lots and lots of layers. Still, at industry scale, this can be probably made quite cheap, especially that the raw material is cheaper than steel, and the processing does not involve energies required to melt steel.
Still, that's a lot of graphene layers, so even if unit cost of adding a layer is low, the whole may cost quite a
Starts expensive, gets cheaper (Score:5, Insightful)
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.
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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 mea
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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.
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Does this mean Boeing will have to rethink the Dreamliner...?
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not only airplanes - just think about the "(paper)balls of steel" award