Carbon atoms are magical and can form the world's softest mineral graphite, but also constitute the hardest material diamond in nature.According to Science and Technology Daily reported on the 24th, recently our scientists have made a breakthrough in carbon atom research: by the Chinese Academy of Sciences Professor Su Gang and his colleagues at the School of Physics have succeeded in synthesizing T-carbon by the joint research team of Chinese and foreign scientists through the birth of a three-dimensional carbon structure T-carbon predicted by theoretical calculations. As a result, T-carbon has become a promising candidate for use with graphite and diamond Another three-dimensional new structure of shoulder to shoulder carbon.
November 23, Su Gang told Science and Technology Daily reporter interviewed that T-carbon is a fluffy carbon material, there is a large internal space available, if used as energy storage material, the hydrogen storage capacity percentage by weight is not Lower than 7.7% .Sugang believes that T-carbon will have a wide range of applications in the fields of photocatalysis, adsorption, storage, aerospace materials and other fields.
Since the 1980s, scientists have had a keen interest in acquiring a new carbon structure and spawned two Nobel Prizes, which not only have a huge impact in related fields such as chemistry, physics, materials and information science, but also spawned large industrial and technological Applications Based on these structures, scientists have synthesized many new derivatives and made new functional devices and related products.
There are four valence electrons on the carbon atom. After the orbital hybridization (some original atomic orbitals are recombined into new atomic orbitals), it is like four hands and has strong combination with itself and other elements The ability of carbon to form sp2 hybridized graphene to form sp3 hybrid diamond, as well as sp-sp2 hybrid graphene, sp-sp3 hybridized diamond alkyne. 'Chemically, carbon can be combined with other elements in Together, it consists of DNA, proteins and other important biological macromolecules, making carbon one of the most essential elements of life on Earth, 'says Su Gang.
Structural Transformation of MWCNTs (Multi-walled Carbon Nanotubes) to T-carbon Nanowires
Different Patterns of T-Fence and Structure of Single T-Carbon Nanowire
In 2011, Su Gang, a doctoral candidate led by Thunder Thunder and so through a large number of comparative studies proposed that if each carbon atom in the cubic diamond with a four-carbon atoms composed of regular tetrahedron structural unit will be formed carbon A new three-dimensional cubic crystal structure, based on first-principles density functional theory studies, found that this structure is extremely stable in terms of geometry, energy and kinetics. They named this new allotrope of carbon T-carbon. Studies have shown that T-carbon has the same space group with diamond is a semiconductor with a direct bandgap, doping can be used to adjust the band gap for photocatalysis. T-carbon also has a distinct feature , The density is very small, about two-thirds of graphite, half of diamond.
Su-Gang and others calculated by calculation that T-carbon may be easier to form in the negative pressure environment T-carbon may be observed in cosmic interstellar dust or extrasolar planets.
Experts on the discovery of T-carbon spoke highly of the fact that T-carbon opened up a new era of carbon structure research and would inspire other scientists to conduct extensive theoretical and experimental research. '
T-carbon can be synthesized in the laboratory? Su-Gang in recent years has been committed to promoting the experimental synthesis of T-carbon .2017 early, Xi'an Jiaotong University and Singapore Nanyang Technological University, a joint research team suspended by the picosecond laser irradiation Methanol solution of multi-walled carbon nanotubes successfully transitioned from sp2 to sp3 under the condition of extreme deviations from the thermodynamic equilibrium state. The new carbon material formed by the new method is completely consistent with the theoretical predicted T-carbon, which proves that the synthesis of T-carbon. The experimental results on the synthesis of T-carbon were published in "Nature and Communication" shortly before.
