WeirdoW

If you haven’t picked this up yet, I am a bit of a nerd ( I even have the spectacles to prove it). So I recently read an article that has me tripping. And it’s all about the wonder material called graphene. This stuff is the real deal. The kind that has the potential to change the world and take every industry to a whole new level.

Some background first. The material is not exactly a new discovery. We have known about it since 2004 but we hadn’t figured out how to make it usable. There’s even a joke in scientific circles that graphene can do everything but leave the lab. So why is this grandchild of graphite such a big deal? I’ll tell you why.

This material is actually 200 times stronger than steel and 40 times stronger than diamonds while still being one atom thick and even bulletproof when two atoms thick. And that’s not even including the fact that it is the most efficient conductor ever discovered seeing as it can hold 6 times the energy density than copper can. Crazy, I know.

And that’s not all. It’s biggest potential use is in battery technology. This stuff, which btw is obtained by essentially filling down graphite till it’s ridiculously thin, like 2D type of thin, can catapult our power storage technology into the future. So you may be thinking, “How the hell is what is essentially the distant cousin of your pencil gonna do so much.” The answer is quite obvious actually. And it’s that simplicity is the ultimate sophistication. It’s hexagonal structure and conductive properties give it unique features that make it’s potential ridiculously vast.

Can you imagine a battery that lasts twice as long as the lithium-ion batteries we are currently using? Now think of how much of our modern tech needs batteries. From cars, planes, and motorcycles to phones, heart pace setter thingys (dunno the name), solar power storage, heck there’s even a power station in Australia that’s all battery. And that barely even scratches the surface. This material will likely spark the creation of previously unthought-of industries.

Heck, I’m even tempted to relate it to the birth of the internet. the crazy doesn’t stop there, get this, it is the thinnest material ever discovered in addition to being the strongest material ever tested.  But just like it was when the internet was born, we still haven’t properly figured out how to make use of the stuff. We do have one thing working for us though, it will likely be a lot cheaper (once standardized) than the current lithium battery technology per kilowatt-hour. I won’t get too technical on the matter since this post would get long really fast. Just know that the stuff is enough of a big deal to earn each of the two scientists who figured out how to extract it in a usable form a Nobel peace prize. Strangely enough, they actually did so using tape.

If you guys would like me to go in-depth on this topic, do tell me in the comments below. Till next week my people!!