By: Mike Williams, Rice University

A new type of conductive graphene foam is incredibly tough and can be formed into just about any shape and size.

A chunk of the foam, which is reinforced by carbon nanotubes, can support more than 3,000 times its own weight and easily bounce back to its original height.

The Rice University lab of chemist James Tour tested this new “rebar graphene” as a highly porous, conductive electrode in lithium ion capacitors and found it to be mechanically and chemically stable. The results appear in the journal ACS Applied Materials and Interfaces.

Carbon in the form of atom-thin graphene is among the strongest materials known and is highly conductive; multiwalled carbon nanotubes are widely used as conductive reinforcements in metals, polymers and carbon matrix composites. The Tour lab had already used nanotubes to reinforce two-dimensional sheets of graphene. Extending the concept to macroscale materials made sense, says Tour, a professor of computer science and of materials science and nanoengineering.

“We developed graphene foam, but it wasn’t tough enough for the kind of applications we had in mind, so using carbon nanotubes to reinforce it was a natural next step,” Tour adds.

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New research demonstrates the development of the first stretchable integrated circuit, made entirely using an inkjet printer.

The team behind this research believes this development could lead to the manufacturing of inexpensive “smart fabric.” Potential applications include wallpaper that can turn an entire wall into an electronic display and electronics that could be scaled up and down easily.

“We can conceivably make the costs of producing flexible electronics comparable to the costs of printing newspapers,” says Chuan Wang, co-author of the paper and former ECS member. “Our work could soon lead to printed displays that can easily be stretched to larger sizes, as well as wearable electronics and soft robotics applications.”

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By: Shontavia Johnson, Drake University

America has long been the land of innovation. More than 13,000 years ago, the Clovis people created what many call the “first American invention” – a stone tool used primarily to hunt large game. This spirit of American creativity has persisted through the millennia, through the first American patent granted in 1641 and on to today.

One group of prolific innovators, however, has been largely ignored by history: black inventors born or forced into American slavery. Though U.S. patent law was created with color-blind language to foster innovation, the patent system consistently excluded these inventors from recognition.

As a law professor and a licensed patent attorney, I understand both the importance of protecting inventions and the negative impact of being unable to use the law to do so. But despite patents being largely out of reach to them throughout early U.S. history, both slaves and free African-Americans did invent and innovate.

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A team of researchers from Georgia Institute of Technology recently developed a new form of ransomware that could take over control of water treatment plants. The simulated hacking exercise was able to command programmable logic controls (PLCs) to shut down water valves, increase or decrease the amount of chemicals used to treat water, and churn out false readings.

According to the researchers, simulations were conducted to highlight the vulnerabilities in critical infrastructure. This research comes at a time when cyber security concerns have reached a high point in light of recent cyber attacking and hacking attempts across the globe.

Cyber attacks go far beyond the acquisition of emails and corruption of websites. Any establishment with PLCs is, in theory, vulnerable to hacking. This could range from water infrastructure, as demonstrated here, to electrical dependency.

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Show science and our community some love this Valentine’s Day, and donate $20 to ECS’s Free the Science campaign.

Nominations Deadline: April 1, 2017

ECS is currently accepting nominations for the following awards of the Electrodeposition Division (ELDP):

ELDP Research Award: established in 1979 to recognize outstanding research contributions to the field of electrodeposition and to encourage the publication of high quality papers in the Journal of The Electrochemical Society.

ELDP Early Career Investigator Award: established in 2015 to recognize an outstanding early career researcher in the field of electrochemical deposition science and technology. Early recognition of highly qualified scientists is intended to enhance his/her stature and encourage especially promising researchers to remain active in the field.

Please review the full award criteria for distinct application requirements before making the nomination.

The two Electrodeposition Division Awards are part of ECS Honors & Awards Program, one that has recognized professional and volunteer achievement within our multi-disciplinary sciences for decades. Learn more about various forms of ECS recognition and those who share the spotlight as past award winners.

Nominate a colleague today!

According to the U.N. Refugee Agency, over 30,000 people are forced to flee their homes every day. A new feature from NPR highlights one professor from Leipzig University that decided to take action on the refugee crisis, addressing the around 6,000 refugees living in her city.

Carmen Bachmann believed that as a professor, it was her duty to ease this problem, and she sought out to do so by providing advanced academic training to those in refugee camps. Listen to the full story above.

In an effort to develop an eco-friendly battery, researchers from Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology (UNIST) have created a battery that can store and produce electricity by using seawater.

The research is expected to dramatically improve cost and stability issues over the next five years, with researchers confident about commercialization.

The driving force behind the battery is the sodium found in seawater. Because sodium is so abundant, the researchers believe that this new system will be an attractive supplement to existing battery technologies. Because the seawater battery is cheaper and more environmentally friendly than lithium-ion batteries, the team says the seawater battery could provide an alternative option in large-scale energy storage.

This from UNIST:

Seawater batteries are similar to their lithium-ion cousins since they store energy in the same way. The battery extracts sodium ions from the seawater when it is charged with electrical energy and stores them within the cathode compartment. Upon electrochemical discharge, sodium is released from the anode and reacts with water and oxygen from the seawater cathode to form sodium hydroxide. This process provide energy to power, for instance, an electric vehicle.

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The estimated total number of bacteria of the planet is estimated at five nonillion, and the world of bacteria is stocked with potential, including electrical production.

Researchers from the University of California are looking to tap into some of that potential by looking at “electrogenic” bacteria, which generate current as part of their metabolism. The research team has found a new way to mimic that ability upon non-electrogenic bacteria, opening up opportunities for new developments in sustainable electricity generation and wastewater treatment.

“The concept here is that if we just close the lid of the wastewater treatment tank and then give the bacteria an electrode, they can produce electricity while cleaning the water,” says Zach Rengert, co-first author of the study. “And the amount of electricity they produce will never power anything very big, but it can offset the cost of cleaning water.”

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Bill Nye the Science Guy first debuted in 1993, bringing an entertaining and educational program to public television. After 100 episodes, the show went off air in 1998, but Nye has continued to hold a prominent place in mainstream scientific dialogue.

Now, Nye is going back to his roots with Bill Nye Saves the World, set to air on Netflix on April 21.