Graphene added to rubber to create stronger and stretchier material

This is the claim of Dr Aravind Vijayaraghavan and Dr Maria Iliut from Manchester University who’ve added very small amounts of graphene to rubber films to increase their strength and the elasticity by up to 50 per cent. Their work is described in Carbon.

In their experiments, the scientists added graphene of different kinds, amounts and size to natural rubber, comprised of polyisoprene, and man-made polyurethane.

In most cases, they observed that the resulting composite material could be stretched to a greater degree and with greater force before it broke. Adding one tenth of one per cent of graphene is said to have made the rubber 50 per cent stronger.

Dr Iliut said: “We use a form of graphene called graphene oxide, which unlike graphene is stable as a dispersion in water. The rubber materials are also in a form that is stable in water, allowing us to combine them before forming thin films with a process called dip moulding.”