Thursday, July 5, 2012

"Graphene Can Improve Desalination Efficiency by Several Orders of Magnitude, Can Do Pretty Much Anything"

 As I said in "The 2010 Nobel prizes: Physics--Graphene Researchers Geim and Novoselov Win":
Unlike the Peace Prize, you have to actually do something to win this one.
Materials science, yeah baby...
This really is a BFD.
Today's graphene story comes to us via Geekosystem:
Graphene. It can be stronger than steel and thinner than paper. It can generate electricity when struck by light. It can be used in thin, flexible supercapacitors that are up to 20 times more powerful than the ones we use right now and can be made in a DVD burner. It’s already got an impressive track record, but does it have any more tricks up its sleeve? Apparently, yes. According to researchers at MIT, graphene could also increase the efficicency of desalination by two or three orders of magnitude. Seriously, what can’t this stuff do?...MORE
HT: naked capitalism

Previously:
Andre Geim First in History to Win Both the Nobel and the IgNobel Prizes
The folks at Improbable Research (on blogroll at left) must be saying "We're so proud".
They recognized Mr. Geim's genius back in 2000 for his pioneering work in in the field of frog levitataion.
The awards celebrate achievements that "cannot or should not be reproduced."
Here is the ref. for other scholars who wish to follow his path...
Nobelprize.org interviews Physics Laureate Geim about his Ig Nobel
Climateer Line of the Day: Gecko Tape Edition
"The Future of Building Materials"
Bigger, Stretchier Graphene
"10 Companies Reinventing Our Energy Infrastructure"
Optoelectronics: Graphene shows its colours