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Carbon wins a cluster of Nobel prizes Carbon scientists' dual Nobel success prompts calls for more government funding of 'curiosity research'It is the stuff of coal, soot, diamonds, radiocarbon dating, pencils, climate change, graphite lubricants, charcoal 窶 and a startling number of Nobel prizes. Carbon, it turns out, is the element most likely to win you the ultimate scientific prize. Last week two different awards 窶 the chemistry and the physics Nobels 窶 went to groups of researchers working on the element, adding to an already sizeable number of prizes given for carbon research.Examples include the 1996 chemistry Nobel, which was given to UK researcher Harry Kroto and others for creating carbon "buckyballs", in which 60 atoms of the element were linked together to form a sphere, opening the door to the creation of tiny carbon-based, super-fast computers. And earlier last century, the Nobel chemistry prize was given to US researcher Willard Libby, who exploited the decay of a naturally occurring isotope of carbon to date ancient artefacts. Radiocarbon dating has since transformed archaeology.And then there are the Nobel prizes for medicine. Every one awarded over the past 110 years could be said to be a prize for carbon research. All living things are made of carbon, including human beings whose bodies are 18.5% carbon by weight. By definition, a Nobel prize for medical or physiological research is therefore a prize for carbon research.However, it is the potential for carbon to be used for industrial and technological applications that has driven recent prizes. These include the unprecedented award last week of two separate Nobels for carbon research. In the case of the chemistry prize, this went to US and Japanese researchers 窶 Richard Heck, Ei-ichi Negishi and Akira Suzuki 窶 for work that has made it easy to create new ranges of carbon-based, organic chemicals, while the physics prize went to Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov, both at Manchester University, for their research on graphene.Graphene is a flat sheet of carbon just one atom thick; it is almost completely transparent, but also extremely strong and a good conductor of electricity 窶 and that is an extremely promising set of properties. Short-term uses for graphene include using it to manufacture light, robust touch-screens and mobile phones.However, graphene has a longer-term potential 窶 one that reveals just how much carbon is beginning to touch our lives, as materials researcher Professor Ton Peijs of Queen Mary, University of London, explains. "People have been working on all sorts of different forms of carbon. For example, 50% of the new Boeing 787 is made out of carbon fibre, making it light and fuel efficient. Now we have the opportunity to use graphene to make even lighter and stronger carbon fibres and so make our aircraft even lighter and stronger." In this way, new forms of carbon will reduce aircraft weight, subsequently cutting the burning of fuel and dumping of carbon in the atmosphere. Other scientists predict that graphene could one day replace silicon, the current basic material used to make transistors.However, there is a crucial aspect to all this carbon research, stresses Professor Laurence Eaves, of Nottingham University. "Breakthroughs like buckyballs and graphene come from curiosity research. They are not driven by some policy maker under a Stalinist system, dictating what should be done. Kroto, Geim and Novoselov could not have said what their work would produce when they began their research. Yet their results turn out to have enormous potential. If politicians want British scientists to continue winning Nobels and opening up new technological processes, they need to realise they have to support and fund curiosity research."Nobel prizesPeople in scienceScience prizesRobin McKieguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds guardian.co.uk |
Green: Weatherization Went Awry, Study Says Twelve of 15 homes that underwent improvements financed by stimulus funds failed final inspections. For 10 homes, contractors billed for charges that were not incurred. feeds.nytimes.com |