Researchers from KAUST show that microbes and nanomaterials like graphene can be used together to form a biohybrid material that performs well as an electrocatalyst. The team says that such materials could be used in the solar-powered production of carbon-free fuels and several other green-energy applications.

A process called the oxygen-evolution reaction (OER) is at the heart of many clean energy technologies. In the case of solar-fuel production, for example, the OER enables the use of solar electricity to split water molecules into oxygen and hydrogen, producing clean hydrogen that can be used as a fuel. Currently, rare and expensive metals are used as OER electrocatalysts. However, graphene-based biohybrid materials could make an inexpensive, eco-friendly alternative, as the team at KAUST has shown.

The Graphene Flagship has announced a call out for new industrial partners to bring specific industrial and technology transfer competences or capabilities that complement the present GF consortium in the next core project (Core 3).

The Graphene Flagship is looking for companies with specific expertise - for example MRAM tools developers to leverage solutions for graphene-spintronic stacks, developers of graphene related materials based laser systems and instrumentations for coherent Raman imaging, makers of graphene-based fibers, yarns and textiles, automotive companies with expertise in fuel-cells, industrial graphene-based supercapacitors makers and more.

The EU Graphene Flagship has published its graphene application roadmap, showing when the flagship expects different graphene applications to mature and enter the market.

As can be seen in the roadmap above (click here for a larger image), the first applications that are being commercialized now are applications such as composite functional coatings, graphene batteries, low-cost printable electronics (based on graphene inks), photodetectors and biosensors.

Log 9 Materials, an IIT Roorkee spin-off that focuses on graphene material production and application development, has recently exhibited a car named Ranger that runs on air and water at India-UK Future Tech event in India.

Log 9 Materials has reportedly developed a metal-air battery made up of aluminium and water, which will make the eclectic vehicles reduce the burden of charging and petrol prices. The graphene-enhanced battery would only require the users to change aluminium from the battery after every 1000kms.

Zenyatta Ventures has announced its plans to raise up to $3,000,000 CAD (around $2,240,000 USD) on a non-brokered private placement basis. The proceeds will be used for bulk sampling, environmental assessment and community engagement.

Zentayya also provided an update on its graphene market development work ,which has led to the creation of five significant potential market verticals for the Company which include aerospace, biomedical, water treatment, transportation and civil engineering.

Researchers at Linköping University (LiU) in Sweden are working to develop a method to convert water and carbon dioxide to the renewable energy of the future, using the energy from the sun and graphene applied to the surface of cubic silicon carbide.

The LiU research group recently reported an important step towards achieving this goal, and developed a method that makes it possible to produce graphene with several layers in a tightly controlled process. They have also shown that graphene acts as a superconductor in certain conditions.

A collaboration led by the University of Tsukuba has recently optimized an approach to increase the stability of catalysts used in the hydrogen evolution reaction without significantly sacrificing activity. The team found that coating catalyst nanoparticles with an optimal number of layers of graphene raised nanoparticle durability while allowing the nanoparticles to retain their catalytic activity. The study was reported in ACS Energy Letters.

"We optimized the balance between the number of graphene layers coating the nanoparticles and their catalytic activity," study first author Kailong Hu says. "To do this, we had to precisely control the number of graphene layers coating the nanoparticles, which we achieved by carefully regulating the deposition time of graphene on the nanoparticles."

Researchers at the Japanese Tsukuba University described a graphene-based electrode that can produce hydrogen under acidic conditions. The electrolysis of water to generate hydrogen is vital for energy storage in a green economy. One of the major obstacles, however, is the high cost of noble-metal electrodes. Cheaper non-noble electrodes function well in driving the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER), but mainly in alkaline conditions, where the reaction is electricity-hungry. The more efficient acid-phase reaction requires precious metals such as platinum. Worse still, the acid electrolytes are corrosive and eat away at the core metal.

The researchers have found that holey graphene offers a way around this problem. They used nitrogen-doped graphene sheets to encapsulate a nickelmolybdenum (NiMo) electrode alloy. The graphene was punched full of nanometer-size holes. The researchers showed that in acid conditions, their HER system dramatically outperforms an electrode using regular non-holey graphene. The use of graphene in HER electrodes is not new—this flexible, conductive carbon sheet is ideal for wrapping around the core metal. However, although it protects the metal against corrosion, graphene also suppresses its chemical activity. In the Tsukuba system, the holes promote the reaction in two ways, while the intact graphene part protects the metal.

Researchers at the Department of Chemistry of the University of Warsaw in Poland have developed a new graphene matrix, as a functional substrate for immobilizing enzymes, and the method of its preparation. The newly-patented graphene matrix may find applications in the food and medicine industries, like the production of biosensors and other electronic devices (eg. bands, tattoos).

Diagram of a lactate biosensor composed of a graphene matrix and a lactate oxidase enzyme, deposited on a carbon electrode

The invention is used as a stable system with high sensitivity, not only in analytical biosensors, but also in bio-fuel cells used in medicine, biology and chemical biocatalysis. The solution concerns the enzymatic (protein) sensor construction for detection of lactates, which can be used in the food industry and medicine for the production of biosensors.

The following is a sponsored post by XFNano

XFNano's graphene materials were recently used in two fascinating research work focused on advanced energy applications.

The first is a work by teams from Anhui Normal University, Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) and the University of the Chinese Academy of Sciences which developed a fast, one-step strategy to prepare sandwiched metal hydroxide/graphene composites through a kinetically controlled coprecipitation under room temperature. Such NiCo-HS@G nano-composite exhibits good electrocatalytic activity for OER, superior to most of the reported OER catalysts. Such performance and the facile preparation of NiCo-HS@G opens up a new avenue for the cost-effective and low-energy-consumption production of various sandwiched metal hydroxides/graphene composites as efficient OER electrocatalysts with desired morphology and competing performance for the applications in diverse energy devices.