Graphene, the wonder material that earned two researchers the 2010 Nobel Prize in Physics and that has been the subject of countless scientific studies and news articles, has certainly spent some time in the limelight. Now it may take center stage under the microscope.
Essentially a one-atom-thick slice of graphite, graphene is the thinnest form of carbon. The material has attracted attention for its strength, transparency and appealing electrical properties.
Now researchers have harnessed graphene’s novel attributes to alleviate one of the challenges of investigating the workings of the nanoscale world—that of applying the tools of high-resolution microscopy to objects in liquid. Electron microscopy can image solid structures down to the scale of single atoms by irradiating small objects with a beam of electrons. But achieving the same resolution for fluid specimens is a tricky enterprise, because electron microscopes require a vacuum to keep air molecules from interfering with the irradiating beam. And vacuums cause liquids to vaporize.
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