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Writer's pictureThe Karan Pargaien

These Carbon Nanostructures are stronger than Diamond

Plate-nanolattices-nanometer sized carbon structures that are designed by Researchers at University of California and Irvine. These nanoparticles are noticed stronger than diamonds as a ratio of strength to density. Let us go a bit deeper into this.



In a recent studies scientists reported that they succeed in conceptualizing and manufacturing a material that is closely-connected, with cell plates structure.

This exciting news was published in Nature's website. They've stated that:


Statement

Though beam-based lattices have dominated mechanical metamaterials for the past two decades, low structural efficiency limits their performance to fractions of the Hashin-Shtrikman and Suquet upper bounds, i.e. the theoretical stiffness and strength limits of any isotropic cellular topology, respectively. While plate-based designs are predicted to reach the upper bounds, experimental verification has remained elusive due to significant manufacturing challenges. Here, we present a new class of nanolattices, constructed from closed-cell plate-architectures. Carbon plate-nanolattices are fabricated via two-photon lithography and pyrolysis and shown to reach the Hashin-Shtrikman and Suquet upper bounds, via in situ mechanical compression, nano-computed tomography and micro-Raman spectroscopy. Demonstrating specific strengths surpassing those of bulk diamond and average performance improvements up to 639% over the best beam-nanolattices, this study provides detailed experimental evidence of plate architectures as a superior mechanical metamaterial topology.


The Pros

  • According to the paper, the team’s design has been shown to improve on the average performance of cylindrical beam-based architectures by up to 639 percent in strength and 522 percent in rigidity.

  • Scientists have predicted that nanolattices arranged in a plate-based design would be incredibly strong.


Innovation

One of the group’s innovations was to include tiny holes in the plates that could be used to remove excess resin from the finished material. As a final step, the lattices go through pyrolysis, in which they’re heated to 900 degree Celsius in a vacuum for one hour. According to Bauer, the end result is a cube-shaped lattice of glassy carbon that has the highest strength scientists ever thought possible for such a porous material.

Bauer said that as you take any piece of material and dramatically decrease its size down to 100 nanometers, it approaches a theoretical crystal with no pores or cracks. Reducing these flaws increases the system’s overall strength.


The End Notes

Nanolattices hold great promise for structural engineers, particularly in aerospace, because it’s hoped that their combination of strength and low mass density will greatly enhance aircraft and spacecraft performance. Well, we have to work harder for achieving it. That's all for today. Will be back with another great article on something very interesting. Till then, have a good one.

Cheers!



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