Rice University, Russian researchers lay out rules for
ultrathin ‘diamane’
Perfect sheets of diamond a few atoms thick appear to be
possible even without the big squeeze that makes natural gems.
Scientists have speculated about it and a few labs have even
seen signs of what they call diamane, an extremely thin film of diamond that
has all of diamond’s superior semiconducting and thermal properties.
Now researchers at Rice University and in Russia have
calculated a “phase diagram” for the creation of diamane. The diagram is a road
map. It lays out the conditions – temperature, pressure and other factors –
that would be necessary to turn stacked sheets of graphene into a flawless
diamond lattice.