Graphene used in radio receiver

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A nanoscale radio receiver has been constructed using molecule thick sheets of graphite. Given that silicon is not actually suitable for radio reception at higher frequencies, this could have some serious implications.

http://www.helium.com/items/2047283-nan ... f-graphene

Nanotechnology made a significant advance in December 2010 as scientists contsructed the world's first nanoradio receiver using graphene, the film-like carbon compound which made headlines earlier this year when its discoverers were awarded the Nobel prize.

According to the arXiv blog on Technologynews.com on December 22nd, 2010. A team of researchers at Columbia University in New York, working under Yuehang Xu, created a kind of trampoline structure using a graphene sheet stretched between two electrodes. A third electrode was placed underneath the sheet, which was then subjected to a small amount of DC current and a radio frequency voltage. The researchers found that this nano-scale device resonates at frequencies which can be easily detected by measuring the capacitance between the graphene sheet, and the electrode below that sheet.

Graphene, a molecule thick carbon compound originally formed by lifting layers from a lead pencil with Scotch tape in a Manchester University laboratory, is a super-light material with amazing properties of strength and flexibility, and the fact that it is so much less massive than, for example, silicon (from which scientists have tried to construct similar nano-scale devices in the past), means that it can detect much higher frequency radio waves, potentially moving up into the GHz range (currently Xu and the team can pick up a radio signal at 33.27 MHz), which could mean the technology could have serious applications for mobile phone manufacturers.