Better Together: Graphene-Nanotube Hybrid Switches

Newswise — Graphene has been called a wonder material, capable of performing great and unusual material acrobatics. Boron nitride nanotubes are no slackers in the materials realm either, and can be engineered for physical and biological applications. However, on their own, these materials are terrible for use in the electronics world. As a conductor, graphene lets electrons zip too fast—there’s no controlling or stopping them—while boron nitride nanotubes are so insulating that electrons are rebuffed like an overeager dog hitting the patio door.

But together, these two materials make a workable digital switch, which is the basis for controlling electrons in computers, phones, medical equipment and other electronics.

Yoke Khin Yap, a professor of physics at Michigan Technological University, has worked with a research team that created these digital switches by combining graphene and boron nitride nanotubes. The journal Scientific Reports recently published their work.

“The question is: How do you fuse these two materials together?” Yap says. The key is in maximizing their existing chemical structures and exploiting their mismatched features.

Read more about how Yap and his team combined these materials here: http://www.mtu.edu/news/stories/2015/july/better-together-graphene-nanotube-hybrid-switches.html