1 upvotes, 2 direct replies (showing 2)
View submission: Ask Anything Wednesday - Engineering, Mathematics, Computer Science
Why are we not seeing more Graphene tech in real world yet? When it first came out people predicted all kinds of amazing applications for it. Feels like that was a lifetime ago and haven't seen much since?
Comment by Meeester at 14/12/2023 at 01:45 UTC
2 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Not only is graphene, and graphene oxide, still a very expensive additive, it's also exceptionally difficult to work with due to its very very very low bulk density. A 75 gram sample of graphene oxide for example is the size of a small throw pillow or a large phonebook, as if it's just a bag filled with black smoke almost. Because it's so fluffy, it's super difficult to mix it (compound it) with high performance polymers/plastics, so again the final price goes up. Graphene's still too prohibitively expensive for large scale production to make full use of it's many high performance characteristics, but these costs have come down dramatically in the past 10-20 years. Think of it like solar which used to be expensive and inefficient, but every year we learn it's even cheaper and better; graphene's just like that but only recently starting to become viable vs its cost. It used to be bleeding-edge expensive, now it's "just" leading-edge expensive.
Comment by Indemnity4 at 13/12/2023 at 23:54 UTC
0 upvotes, 0 direct replies
It is used but it's hidden components inside other complex but boring things.
It's main use is inside things that are inside other more exciting things. It's used in flexible devices such as touch screen displays and solar cells. It's in LED, solar cells and field effect transistors (what the heck are those?) It's inside the iphone 16 as part of the heat sink.
Unfortunately, graphene remains really really really expensive. About USD60k /tonne. Almost every metal/alloy is much cheaper.