Potential applications of graphene
[6] In 2016 researchers revealed that uncoated graphene can be used as neuro-interface electrode without altering or damaging properties such as signal strength or formation of scar tissue.
Integration of graphene (thickness of 0.34 nm) layers as nanoelectrodes into a nanopore[18] can potentially solve a bottleneck for nanopore-based single-molecule DNA sequencing.
[20][21] Researchers at Monash University discovered that a sheet of graphene oxide can be transformed into liquid crystal droplets spontaneously—like a polymer—simply by placing the material in a solution and manipulating the pH.
Doxorubicin (DOX) is embedded onto the graphene sheet, while the molecules of tumor necrosis factor-related apoptosis-inducing ligand (TRAIL) are linked to the nanostructure via short peptide chains.
Injected intravenously, the graphene strips with the drug payload preferentially concentrate to the cancer cells due to common blood vessel leakage around the tumor.
[24][25] The development of nanotechnology and molecular biology has provided the improvement of nanomaterials with specific properties which are now able to overcome the weaknesses of traditional disease diagnostic and therapeutic procedures.
GOs are an abundance of functional groups such as hydroxyl, epoxy, and carboxyl on its basal surface and edges that can be also used to immobilize or load various biomolecules for biomedical applications.
On the other side, biopolymers have frequently been used as raw materials for designing drug delivery formulations owing to their excellent properties, such as non-toxicity, biocompatibility, biodegradability and environmental sensitivity, etc.
HSA nanoparticles have long been the center of attention in the pharmaceutical industry due to their ability to bind to various drug molecules, high storage stability and in vivo application, non–toxicity and antigenicity, biodegradability, reproducibility, scale–up of the production process and a better control over release properties.
[35] Graphene exhibits a pronounced response to perpendicular external electric fields, potentially forming field-effect transistors (FET), but the absence of a band gap fundamentally limits its on-off conductance ratio to less than ~30 at room temperature.
[60] The negative differential resistance experimentally observed in graphene field-effect transistors of conventional design allows for construction of viable non-Boolean computational architectures.
[70][71][72] Large-area, continuous, transparent and highly conducting few-layered graphene films were produced by chemical vapor deposition and used as anodes for application in photovoltaic devices.
[75] A carbon-based device called a light-emitting electrochemical cell (LEC) was demonstrated with chemically-derived graphene as the cathode and the conductive polymer Poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene) (PEDOT) as the anode.
[90] Large-area graphene created by chemical vapor deposition (CVD) and layered on a SiO2 substrate, can preserve electron spin over an extended period and communicate it.
[91] In 2012 Vorbeck Materials started shipping the Siren anti-theft packaging device, which uses their graphene-based Vor-Ink circuitry to replace the metal antenna and external wiring to an RFID chip.
Possible applications include thermal imaging for mobile phones, endoscopes, nanosatellites and photonic chips in supercomputers and superfast broadband distribution.
Computer simulations indicated energy barriers of 0.61–0.75 eV for hydroxyl-terminated atomic defects that participate in a Grotthuss-type relay, while pyrylium-like ether terminations did not.
[118] Recently, Paul and co-workers at IISER Bhopal demonstrated solid state proton conduction for oxygen functionalized few-layer graphene (8.7x10−3 S/cm) with a low activation barrier (0.25 eV).
[140] [141] Due to Graphene's high electrical and thermal conductivity, mechanical strength, and corrosion resistance, one potential application is in high-power energy transmission.
[144] Additionally, in 2021, researchers demonstrated a 4.5 times increase in the current density breakdown limit of copper wire with an axially continuous graphene shell.
[150] Nanoelectromechanical systems (NEMS) can be designed and characterized by understanding the interaction and coupling between the mechanical, electrical, and the van der Waals energy domains.
A scheme to obtain squeezed quantum states through typical experimental graphene NEMS structures taking advantages of its atomic scale thickness has been proposed.
While this effect occurs in other materials, graphene is superior due to its high electrical conductivity (even when few carriers are present) and low noise, which makes this change in resistance detectable.
[153] Density functional theory simulations predict that depositing certain adatoms on graphene can render it piezoelectrically responsive to an electric field applied in the out-of-plane direction.
[154] Promoted by the demand for wearable devices, graphene has been proved to be a promising material for potential applications in flexible and highly sensitive strain sensors.
An environment-friendly and cost-effective method to fabricate large-area ultrathin graphene films is proposed for highly sensitive flexible strain sensor.
When the antenna becomes resonant (an integral number of SPP wavelengths fit into the physical dimensions of the graphene), the SPP/EM coupling increases greatly, efficiently transferring energy between the two.
The waves were focused (by curving the antenna) and refracted (by a prism-shaped graphene bilayer because the conductivity in the two-atom-thick prism is larger than in the surrounding one-atom-thick layer.
[179][180] Stacked graphene layers on a quartz substrate increased the absorption of millimeter (radio) waves by 90 per cent over 125–165 GHz bandwidth, extensible to microwave and low-terahertz frequencies, while remaining transparent to visible light.
This is because of enhanced in-plane heat conduction resulting from the simultaneous increase of thermal resistance between the graphene and the substrate, which limited cross-plane phonon scattering.
