Page 137 - Polymer-based Nanocomposites for Energy and Environmental Applications

112 Polymer-based Nanocomposites for Energy and Environmental Applications

solution [3]; besides this, it also possesses robustness, flexibility, and thermal
stability/environmental stability with outstanding resistance to gas permeation
[34]. All these unique properties ensure a wider and diverse advanced applications
of graphene and its derivative in different industrial fields of optical electronics,
ultrafiltration, catalyst, sensors, composite materials, photovoltaic cells, energy
storage, aerospace, flexible supercapacitor electrodes, smart, intelligent devices,
and biological engineering [22]. Graphene also displayed specific affinity to differ-
ent chemical species and, hence, is used as a sensing material in analytic chemistry
applications [35].

4.3 Graphene applications

Graphene is one of the world’s strongest and highly flexible materials having
one-atom carbon sheets that are highly conductive even than copper [36].
Several research and survey have been made to utilize graphene and graphene-based
material in different industrial fields ranging from catalyst, to medicine, to electron-
ics sensors. Besides this, they are regarded as the most potential material for
applications such as batteries, field-effect transistors, ultrasensitive sensors,
nanoelectronics, electromechanical resonators, supercapacitors, and fuel cells
2
owing to its honeycomb structure having closely packed sp -bonded carbon atoms.
Some of the promising applications of graphene in scientific community are shown
in Fig. 4.10. Some of the applications of graphene, based on its unique properties, are
illustrated in Fig. 4.11 [10].
Graphene has also been reported to be used for the encapsulation of electrochem-
ically active materials for energy storage and conversion due to its high chemical
stability, extraordinary conductivity, excellent flexibility, and preferably large surface
area [37,38]. Graphene and its derivatives like RGO also show electrochemical
prospective as they effectively increase the redox currents by contributing to the

Fig. 4.10 Major
applications of graphene. Electronics
Medicine
Plasmonics
and
Environmental lubricant
Graphene
Light
Sensors processing
Energy
Coolant
and
catalyst