Novamene
The New Beginning
Hidden in obscurity was an allotrope of carbon called Lonesdaleite. This carbon allotrope was discovered by chance in 1967 while studying meteorites. Named in honour of Kathleen Lonsdale, Lonsdaleite is also referred to as hexagonal diamond.
The Nobel Prize in Physics 2010 was awarded jointly to Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov “for groundbreaking experiments regarding the two-dimensional material graphene”. In September 2014, an epiphany came to the Alfields team – could it be possible to combine both hexagonal diamond and graphene to create a new allotrope? From this simple thought, Novamene was born.
Description:
Novamene can simply be described as the combining of hexagonal diamond (Lonesdaleite) and graphene. Since diamond is an electrical insulator and graphene is a conductor, Novamene has the potential to revelutionize the nano-electronics world. In short, Novamene will replace silicon as the primary material for computer chips. Novamene also holds the potential to function as a quantum bit (qbit) and is predicted to be the basis for the fabrication of a room temperature quantum computer. Such a device would dramatically and dynamicaly change all means of high-end computer problem solving.
After developing single-ring Novamene, it became clear that what is magical about this new material is that it can exist as a completely new class of allotropes having many thousands of combinations of graphene rings surrounded by hexagonal diamond. The last time a completely new class of hexagonal diamond had been discovered was in 1986 with the discovery of fullerenes. In short, Novamene is not one material but many thousands of allotropes that are expected usher in a new era in modern science.
Application Fields:
- Quantum Computing
- Semiconductors
- Energy Storage (Batteries)
Protomene
History:
Protomene can be said to be the daughter of Novamene. Novamene has single atom (sp2 bonded) carbon that provided the basis for Novamene to “switch” from semiconductor to metal. It is from on this concept that Protomene was born.
Description:
Novamene is a series of thousands of ring – sp2 carbon atoms surrounded by (sp3 ) hexagonal diamond; while protomene has a combination of both sp2 single atoms. In short, protomene is composed entirely of switch carbon atoms with no hexagonal rings.
Protomene qualifies as a new potentially-useful direct-gap semiconductor. The energy band gap (see published paper below) is very close to that of gallium nitrides (GaN) which is approximately 3.4 eV at room temperature. As a consequence, protomene possesses similar semiconducting properties to GaN, which may enable it to have applications for high-power and/or high-frequency electronic devices with large breakdown voltages. Considering that it is a binary system, the control of GaN composition is challenging during the crystal growth, whereas protomene is a single-element carbon allotrope and defect control might be easier than for GaN. Due to the gap amplitude near the blue end of the visible spectrum, protomene may find applications in opto-electronic components, e.g. to blue- or UV-light generating light emitting diodes (LED), or as a UV filter in optics. Furthermore, the well-defined direct gap suggests that protomene may have more application in semiconductors devices than carbon nanotubes (CNT) and graphene in terms of energy band gap. Indeed, one obstacle to overcome in the fabrication of CNT is controlling whether the CNT is metallic and semiconducting. Protomene instead is predicted to be semiconducting up to a transition temperature.
Application Fields:
- Opto-electronic components, e.g. to blue- or UV-light generating light emitting diodes (LED)
- UV filter in optics
- Semiconductors devices
Link: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0008622317310692