Graphene got a cousin: stanene

[jos]

Tin is made to form a mesh just one atom thick. The thin film, called stanene.. At room temperature, electrons should be able to travel along the edges of the mesh without colliding with other electrons and atoms as they do in most materials. This should allow the film to conduct electricity without losing energy as waste heat.. Stanene is predicted to be an example of a topological insulator, in which charge carriers (such as electrons) cannot travel through a material’s centre but can move freely along its edge, with their direction of travel dependent on whether their spin.

But even after making stanene, Zhang and his colleagues at four universities in China have not been able to confirm that it is a topological insulator. They created the mesh by vaporizing tin in a vacuum and allowing the atoms to waft onto a supporting surface made of bismuth telluride. Although this surface allows 2D stanene crystals to form, it also interacts with them, creating the wrong conditions for a topological insulator, says Zhang.

 

Now we can aee lots of news with Stanene..May be you can see new processor interconnect laye made of these... if we can sandwich this between silicon we can prevent inter- connection too...Although the possibilities of existance of Stanene was predicted years ago.. This was for the first time, they could make it.. There are other 2D materials like silicene, made from silicon atoms; phosphorene, made from phosphorus; germanene, from germanium also transition-metal dichalcogenides.. Which are A single sheet of transition-metal atoms such as molybdenum or tungsten sandwiched between equally thin layers of chalcogens: elements, such as sulfur and selenium

Source: http://www.nature.com/news/physicists-announce-graphene-s-latest-cousin-stanene-1.18113

[niofalpha]

From my small knowledge of Chemistry couldn't any element of the Carbon Family be used to form a Graphene-esk element?

[-rascal-]

From my small knowledge of Chemistry couldn't any element of the Carbon Family be used to form a Graphene-esk element?

 

Theoretically, you could.

 

The problem is, the crystal structure (crystal lattice) for Carbon is extremely stable. You need a lot of electron volts to force it to change -- to replace one of the Carbon atoms with an impurity atom (doping).

 

These impurity atoms commonly used with Silicon includes, Germanium, Arsenic, Boron, etc.

The only reason conventional transistors work is because the Silicon is doped with another element that is more (or less) electrically conductive...hence the term semiconductor.

[Psykomantis00]

"graphenes got a cousin" is she hot?  :lol:

[jos]

"graphenes got a cousin" is she hot?  :lol:

People have different tastes... Some like inter-racial, some inter-species, Some may like Stanene....

[SurvivorNVL]

Welcome to the family, Stan.

[Prysin]

Welcome to the family, Stan.

now were's ma beer son?

[marldorthegreat]

Is no-one reading this? It conducts electricity without waste heat. 

[Trik'Stari]

Is no-one reading this? It conducts electricity without waste heat. 

I feel like that should be much bigger news than it currently is.

 

@LukaP wouldn't this mean near 100% efficiency (as a conductor or insulator?)

[Curufinwe_wins]

Is no-one reading this? It conducts electricity without waste heat.

They haven't actually made it properly apparently so who cares yet.

[ThomasD]

Is no-one reading this? It conducts electricity without waste heat. 

In theory.  

 

But, as the article notes, they really have not made any stanene just yet, so there is no proof.

 

Even if/when they do prove the theory you also have to consider that the conductor is exactly one atom thick.  Any thicker and it conducts just like ordinary tin.  It could prove useful for computational purposes, but won't exactly be efficient for energy transmission.

[jos]

In theory.  

 

But, as the article notes, they really have not made any stanene just yet, so there is no proof.

 

Even if/when they do prove the theory you also have to consider that the conductor is exactly one atom thick.  Any thicker and it conducts just like ordinary tin.  It could prove useful for computational purposes, but won't exactly be efficient for energy transmission.

Actually they have made it.. with available equipment, they can confirm it. but need more costly equipment to confirm it. the problem is some interaction preventing it to show that property.. It can even be less than 1 mm in length.. the inventor of graphene made it using a sellotape and it was tiny.. he won Nobel price.. The thing is he knew exactly what he was doing

[ThomasD]

Actually they have made it.. with available equipment, they can confirm it. but need more costly equipment to confirm it. the problem is some interaction preventing it to show that property.. It can even be less than 1 mm in length.. the inventor of graphene made it using a sellotape and it was tiny.. he won Nobel price.. The thing is he knew exactly what he was doing

 

"Although this surface allows 2D stanene crystals to form, it also interacts with them, creating the wrong conditions for a topological insulator"

 

You see the bit I emphasized?  They have managed to place a one atom thick layer of tin onto a substrate but it is not certain that this is actually stanene.  Read the very next paragraph of the linked article.

 

"Ralph Claessen, a physicist at the University of Würzburg in Germany, says that it is not completely clear that the researchers have made stanene. Theory predicts that the 2D tin lattice should form a buckled honeycomb structure, with alternate atoms folding upwards to form corrugated ridges; Zhang and his team could only see the upper ridge of atoms with their scanning tunnelling microscope. However, they are confident that they have created a buckled honeycomb, partly because the distance between ridges matches predictions."

 

Until they can create the single atom layer, independent of an interacting substrate, or confirm the appearance of the predicted unique qualities via testing, their accomplishment remains questionable.

[jos]

 

Until they can create the single atom layer, independent of an interacting substrate, or confirm the appearance of the predicted unique qualities via testing, their accomplishment remains questionable.

 If you read the original published paper there are strong references of it being real deal.. But they do not have  equipment to confirm it either...May be recreating the experiment elsewhere is the only way to prove it.. I am not posting the original publishing article as i posted once a source like that and a mod asked me to remove to give another source as it was violation of LTT policy as the link redirects to pay before viewing..

[ThomasD]

 If you read the original published paper there are strong references of it being real deal.. But they do not have  equipment to confirm it either...May be recreating the experiment elsewhere is the only way to prove it.. I am not posting the original publishing article as i posted once a source like that and a mod asked me to remove to give another source as it was violation of LTT policy as the link redirects to pay before viewing..

I wish I could read the original paper (but don't want to pay $32 to do so).

 

Mainly because I'd like to know more about their technique, especially the temperature and pressure involved.  The two common allotropes of tin being somewhat temperature dependent, and the others requiring significant temperature and pressure.  If this sort of substance can only be created at extreme atmospherics it will still be interesting, but much less useful.

[jos]

I wish I could read the original paper (but don't want to pay $32 to do so).

 

Mainly because I'd like to know more about their technique, especially the temperature and pressure involved.  The two common allotropes of tin being somewhat temperature dependent, and the others requiring significant temperature and pressure. 

To be honest... i did one of my masters on a student exchange scheme.. Only 7 students has studied it under the scheme ever..The university forgot to remove our account from their servers, i can still read all the journal in the world for free by logging in remotely to university.. It is one of the top 50 universities in the world...Else it is costly to read for fun...

[Nielips]

Quotes the most misleading part of the article, they haven't proved it or it's properties experimentally.