India’s First Graphene Innovation Centre to be Established in Thrissur
India’s first graphene innovation centre to be established in thrissur
What is the news:
The India Innovation Centre for Graphene (IICG) will be established in Thrissur, Kerala, as part of a joint venture between Pune-headquartered Centre for Materials for Electronics Technology (CMET), Digital University Kerala (DUK), Tata Steel Limited and other industries.
A first-of-its-kind centre for studying graphene and developing its newer applications as suitable for industries has recently been approved by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY).
About the new centre:
The newest centre aims at promoting and performing R&D on graphene as per the industry requirements.
While synthesis of graphene is known and many studies have been performed using graphene, our focus will be widening the scope of applications using grapheme.
Of the Rs 34 crore estimated for establishing the centre, the partnering industries will contribute 60 per cent funding.
Being a good conductor of electricity and highly flexible, this two-dimensional form of crystalline carbon has enormous number of applications ranging from electronic wearable devices, biomedical devices, sensors, fuel cells, semiconductors, field emission displays, nanoelectrodes for inexpensive organic electronic devices such as organic photovoltaics (OPVs), liquid-crystal devices (LCDs), organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs), supercapacitors, fuel cells and batteries.
The ministry of electronics and IT has given approval for the Rs 86.41-crore-project.
The centre, which will be implemented with the support of state government, has the potential to accelerate Kerala’s growth in the knowledge industry sector.
Tata Steel Ltd will be the industrial partner of the centre.
What exactly is graphene?
Graphene is a crystalline allotrope of carbon with 2-dimensional properties. Graphene is very thin and nearly transparent and is a single layer of graphite. It is remarkably strong at 200 times stronger than steel and conducts heat and electricity with great efficiency.
Graphene, on the other hand, is the strongest material ever recorded, more than three hundred times stronger than A36 structural steel, at 130 gigapascals, and more than forty times stronger than diamond.
What is graphene used for today?
Transport, medicine, electronics, energy, defence, desalination; the range of industries where graphene research is making an impact is substantial.
Why graphene is so important?
Graphene Has the Best Electrical Conductivity of Any Material. Electricity flows very quickly through the simple honeycomb sheet.
Most conductors we encounter are metals, yet graphene is based on carbon, a nonmetal.
This allows for the development of electricity to flow under conditions where we might not want a metal.