(This article has been simplified for young children)
GRAPHENE is thought to be the new ‘miracle material’.
It is unbreakable, tougher than diamond, but stretchable like rubber, and can carry electric charges far faster than currently used materials. Yet, it is only about a 1-atom thick sheet of graphite, a form of carbon. To get a sense of how thin that is, aluminium foil is thousands of atoms thick!
It was discovered only a few years ago, and can potentially be used in everything from medicine to computers, as well as hydrogen storage for zero-emission cars, solar panels, DNA sequencing, capacitors for the next generation of electric cars, chemical sensors and much more.
The 2 scientists, Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov, from the University of Manchester, won the 2010 Nobel Prize in physics.
Click here for more on Graphene from BBC
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