Functionalisation of Graphene Oxide

"We have invented a new advanced material of copolymers to meet the market requirement for the potential application including the development of fouling resistance materials. The materials we have developed include functionalised graphene oxide (FGO).

Graphene is currently one of the most exciting advanced materials. It is a disruptive technology, which is expected to replace many existing technologies and revolutionise future ones due to its remarkable physicochemical properties. It is the world's first 2D material, UK scientist has been awarded Nobel prize in 2010 for its isolation. It is hundreds of times stronger than steel, but it is lighter than a feather and incredibly flexible. It is electrically and thermally conductive, yet transparent. If you functionalised GO, its usage becomes even wider. FGO can be used in marine, agriculture, transport, mining, electronics, energy, desalination and many other industries. We have taken the advantage of these unique properties in the copolymer we invented. Hence it has cost and performance impact on our product.

FGO sells at 350-1000+ times more expensive than GO. The leading producers are non-UK and they are creating FGO either inconsistently and/or very expensively, which makes its use difficult for us and for others. Current pricing makes it even prohibitive for many fields.

We identified new and cheaper way how to make FGO, and how to make it more efficient, but we need co-operation from National Physical Laboratory (NPL) to help us to measure the functionalisation of GO, to characterise it and to establish Quality Assurance of its production.

To become the FGO producer fits well into our processes as we are already advanced material maker and supplier.

We have a new method for the functionalisation for creating cheaper and higher performing FGO. But we have no way of measuring its efficiency and quality and for its characterisation. NPL has the analytical tools and expertise for bridging this gap.

The objective of this project is to create a new method of making FGO, which will make our material more reliable, consistent, better performing and dramatically cheaper. This will open its uses for more fields to other market participants.

This will increase our revenue, create more jobs and will make FGO more viable for use by other industries and research scientists.

It will establish UK as lead producer in this fast evolving and increasing market of FGO and move forward graphene's demand and applications."