GRAPHENE&APPLICATIONS TO ROCKETS

First of all let's talk about what is graphene. Graphene is a form of carbon consisting of planar sheets which are one atom thick, with the atoms arranged in a honeycomb-shaped lattice. It comes from Graphite that comes from Carbon.

In this image we see different structures with different bonds that are formed with carbon atoms.

To understand how graphene is formed we have to understand the principal element of it. In this case is CARBON.

Carbon is one of the most important chemical elements in nature. It is found in all living beings and, as its atoms are distributed, it can appear in the different characteristics.

When small carbon particles are grouped very densely into thin two-dimensional sheets and remain a regular hexagonal pattern GRAPHENE is formed.

The shape in which carbons are remind us of a hive, where bees live and it is formed with six carbon atoms and bounded with four single bonds and two double bonds.

In 2004, when scientists of Russian origin Novoselov and Geim managed to isolate it at room temperature, although scientists thought it was too unstable. This discovery was not insignificant, because thanks to him he won the Nobel Prize in 2010.

PROPERTIES:

Graphene has AMAZING properties and this ones are some of them:

• High termic and electric conductivity.

• Semiconductor.

• High elasticity and hardness.

• Resistance (the toughest material in the world).

• Graphene can react chemically with other substances to form compounds with different properties, which gives this material great potential for development.

• Supports ionizing radiation.

• It is very light, like carbon fiber, but more flexible.

• Less Joule effect, less heat when driving electrons.

• Consume less electricity for the same task as silicon.

Due to its properties, graphene can serve as material in the manufacture of airplanes, space satellites or automobiles, making them safer. Also in the construction of buildings, because it made them more resistant. This could also be to rockets, satellites and spacecraft.

A team of researchers at MIT has designed one of the strongest lightweight materials known, by compressing and fusing flakes of graphene, a two-dimensional form of carbon. The new material, a sponge-like configuration with a density of just 5 percent, can have a strength 10 times that of steel.

In its two-dimensional form, graphene is thought to be the strongest of all known materials. But researchers until now have had a hard time translating that two-dimensional strength into useful three-dimensional materials.

The new findings show that the crucial aspect of the new 3-D forms has more to do with their unusual geometrical configuration than with the material itself.

Other groups had suggested the possibility of such lightweight structures, but lab experiments so far had failed to match predictions, with some results exhibiting several orders of magnitude less strength than expected. The MIT team decided to solve the mystery by analyzing the material’s behavior down to the level of individual atoms within the structure. They were able to produce a mathematical framework that very closely matches experimental observations.

Two-dimensional materials — basically flat sheets that are just one atom in thickness but can be indefinitely large in the other dimensions — have exceptional strength as well as unique electrical properties. But because of their extraordinary thinness, “they are not very useful for making 3-D materials that could be used in vehicles, buildings, or devices,” “What we’ve done is to realize the wish of translating these 2-D materials into three-dimensional structures.”

The team was able to compress small flakes of graphene using a combination of heat and pressure. This process produced a strong, stable structure whose form resembles that of some corals and microscopic creatures called diatoms. These shapes, which have an enormous surface area in proportion to their volume, proved to be remarkably strong.

they created a variety of 3-D models and then subjected them to various tests. that's when they realizes that graphene has 5 percent the density of steel, but 10 times the strength.

what happens to their 3-D graphene material, resembles what would happen with sheets of paper. Paper has little strength along its length and width, and can be easily crumpled up. But when made into certain shapes, for example rolled into a tube, suddenly the strength along the length of the tube is much greater and can support substantial weight. Similarly, the geometric arrangement of the graphene flakes after treatment naturally forms a very strong configuration.

They printed them based on atomistic computational modeling by the MIT team, ruled out a possibility proposed previously by other teams: that it might be possible to make 3-D graphene structures so lightweight that they would actually be lighter than air, and could be used as a durable replacement for helium in balloons. The current work shows, however, that at such low densities, the material would not have sufficient strength and would collapse from the surrounding air pressure.

the researchers say that we could use it for something that require a combination of extreme strength and light weight. “You could either use the real graphene material or use the geometry we discovered with other materials, like polymers or metals,” Buehler says, to gain similar advantages of strength combined with advantages in cost, processing methods, or other material properties (such as transparency or electrical conductivity).

For actual synthesis, the researchers say, one possibility is to use the polymer or metal particles as templates, coat them with graphene by chemical vapor deposit before heat and pressure treatments, and then chemically or physically remove the polymer or metal phases to leave 3-D graphene in the gyroid form( round, but full of holes). For this, the computational model given in the current study provides a guideline to evaluate the mechanical quality of the synthesis output

my conclusion is that the development of this new material opens up new possibilities of exit. It is the first crystalline material in 2D and has unique properties, which is interesting both for fundamental science and for future applications in rockets and spacecraft.

as well as to build spaceships and rockets to use it as a cooling system, since with less heat the rocket would go more efficiently.