Graphene - Miraculous material that saves the Earth from the threat of nuclear waste

Scientists have found the dominant use of a "metamaterial" - graphene.

Graphene - the thinnest and strongest metamaterial in the world to date - will even be more "aggressive" when it can be used to detoxify nuclear waste .

The one who discovered this was Professor Andre Geim of Manchester University. He was also the father of graphene in 2004. At that time, the material shocked the scientific community because of its extraordinary characteristics: as thin as an atom, extremely high lateral, very good electrical conductivity .

Graphene's carbon crystal network

According to his experiments, graphene could now also become a " super-filter ", with the ability to separate hydrogen isotopes and create a more expensive molecule: heavy water (water containing lots of deuterium - isotopes of hydrogen - which is essential in the nuclear industry.

In addition, graphene can also be used to clean up tritium- contaminated nuclear waste (a radioactive isotope of hydrogen). According to Marcelo Lozada-Hidalgo - one of the study's authors: "Graphene is the best filter today, can remove particles even smaller than atoms. This is an application no one has ever thought of ."

Super materials now have even more hegemonic use - cleaning up garbage

Dr. Lozada-Hidalgo shared: " Tritium is a product of many nuclear reactors, and it needs to be removed from the environment. Graphene can do this very well. In addition, it can do it. so a revolution in heavy water production is much cheaper. "

Nuclear waste can now be decontaminated by graphene

Professor Irina Grigorieva - co-author of the study: " We are really surprised by the ability to filter subatomic particles of this material. I can see a lot of applications in biology, chemistry, physics and nuclear science from this discovery ".

The study is published in the journal Science.

Graphene is a metamaterial, composed of a carbon lattice arranged in layers just one atom thick.

Graphene is a super material: super thin, super durable, superconducting. Graphene's potential applications can now be described as highly flexible electrical devices, or a generation of computers with super-fast speeds.