Graphene Just Won Two Guys the Nobel. So What the Hell Is It? [Physics]

Today, two professors won the Nobel prize for physics ” for groundbreaking experiments in regards to the two-dimensional material graphene.” The Nobel is the Olympic gold of science. But what is graphene, and why did it earn these guys over a million bucks?

Some Nobels in physics are (relatively) straightforward. In 1935, James Chadwick discovered the neutron. a large deal, obviously, but something that you would be able to understand by 11th grade. But today’s award- presented to Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov -is for a two-dimensional material. A what? Not exactly high school stuff. So let’s break it down.

Graphene is, put most simply, five carbon atoms-a similar stuff for your pencil-arranged in a hexagon. (Fun fact: the pair started their work with graphene by peeling off layers of tangible pencil led with scotch tape). This doesn’t sound like anything special, except the indisputable fact that, as Geim himself explains, ” Everything in our three-dimensional world has a width, length and height. That was what we thought, not less than.” Geim and Novoselov’s work expands our understanding of materials that don’t have any of these dimensional properties, because they may be just one atom thick. They’re lacking a complete dimension.

It’s hard to imagine-but that’s type of the point. The duo’s work is on the frontier of a whole class of stuff that we’re only just now becoming ready to conceive of. Geim himself says he has no idea the extent to which a fabric reminiscent of graphene is likely to be useful. But we do know that it’s super cool. Despite (or rather, due to) its measly two-dimensionality, graphene is the strongest and thinnest substance within the known universe, will likely be stretched like rubber, and is impregnable by liquid or gas . It also conducts electricity, allowing it to (someday) beat the pants off the copper and silicon we use in, well, commonly everything. Still unimpressed? A layer of graphene could hold up a truck atop a pencil. You don’t look so great now, do you, neutron.

So what’s next? ” Optimists say we are entering a carbon age. Even pessimists argue only that the impact can be somewhat less,” says Geim, who is, naturally, excited: ” I am hoping that graphene and other two-dimensional crystals will change daily life as plastics did for humanity.” So we’ll have got to wait and spot, but still-job well done, gents.

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This post is tagged: dimensionality, indisputable fact, james chadwick, nobel prize for physics, three dimensional world