A Korea-based corporation has pledged to invest at least $1 million in an East Lansing company that’s an off-shoot of research at
Michigan State University.
The agreement between
Hanwha Group and
XG Sciences will allow the local company to increase production of a nano-sized material called
xGnP graphene nanoplatelets.
The material was discovered and developed by MSU chemical engineering professor Lawrence Drzal and can be used to strengthen the properties of natural graphite.
“Graphite is a very cheap mineral and has a lot of attractive properties,” Drzal says. “It’s very lightweight, very stiff, and it doesn’t burn. But if you look at the structure of graphite, it looks like a stack of dishes. The forces that hold the layers of graphite together are very weak.
“So the thought that occurred to us was if we could produce these individual layers of graphite, then all those desirable properties of graphite could go into whatever we added it to. That was the basis of the work.”
Drzal and his partner in XG Sciences, Mike Knox, currently produce 25 pounds of the material every day from a refurbished plant in Lansing. The new funding will allow the company to eventually produce as much as 1,000 pounds a day, Drzal said.
Source: Professor Lawrence Drzal, MSU
Writer: Louise Knott Ahern
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