Create plastic that can conduct electricity

Scientists in Australia have found a completely new technique to create metal with plastic and even superconducting properties.

Plastic has superconducting properties

Plastics are very poorly conductive and they are used to insulate electrical cables. However, by placing a thin sheet of metal into the plastic layer and then mixing it into a polymer surface thanks to ion beams, the scientists showed that the method would produce cheap conductive plastic sheets, both durable and flexible.

This research has just been published in ChemPhysChem by a group of scientists: Paul Meredith, Ben Powell (of the University of Queensland) and Adam Micolich (of the University of New South Wales).

The ion beam technique has been widely used in the microelectronics industry to generate conductivity for substances such as silicon. But efforts to apply this process to plastic sheets from the 80s of the last century have not yielded much results.

Researcher Paul Meredith said: " What we've created here is to use ion beams to modify the properties of plastic sheets so that it can conduct electricity like the metal used in electrical wires. it can become superconducting material if it is cooled enough . "

This breakthrough will open a new way for electrical equipment made from plastic to develop.

It is worth mentioning that this material is easily made based on existing devices used in the microelectronics industry and they are not affected when exposed to oxygen compared to standard semiconductor polymers. now on.