The Wonder Crystal

2016: A soldier on an anti terrorist raid reaches for his 18 pound battery to charge his light source. Even a single lapse is not allowed during a gun fight. There is rapid fire and silence….

2025: There is a creaking of the twig. The soldier swings around and gives it to the terrorist from his light rapid fire self loader.

He gulps down cool refresher from the bag-pack and looks at the mean looking battery stitched into his army colored shirt. The mini ultra-lite battery is a hybrid and is charged by his body heat and the sunlight. It allows him a perpetual auto charge of his power needs on the rough terrain. Allowing him to stay out more and give more time to track down targets.

Body heat charger – a fancy new graphene gadget.

2026: 23.2 million viewers. It is still 0-0 and just 8 minutes left in the game. The star player wipes the sweat drops trickling down his forehead places the ball at the right place and prepares for the free kick. Just then, a visual message drops into the gadget on his wrist.

It’s his coach who has sent him a visual. His teammate too receives the same visual. The ball swirls to the right of the defender at the extreme corner. Just where his team mate has positioned himself. It’s all over. Just the sleight of the body movement and a powerful kick and the ball rocks past the wall of defenders past the arc of the goal keeper and rocks into the goal.

Bendable wearable smart phone. Graphene.

2027: The lights are dimmed. The procedure is over in quick time. The smart looking medic with a white gown over blue shirt comes out to brief you. Your dear one has had a smart drug delivery session. And the medic’s pleasant smile tells all. Everything’s fine. Will she have side effects of cancer therapy?

“No not at all. This is the new smart drug delivery system.”

You might restrict cancer to a large extent with a good long term survival rate. But then you need to suffer the excruciating side effects. Because the drug travels throughout your body to reach the cancer.

What if a nano drug delivered the therapy only to the tumor? The side effects would be non-existent. Current research is also veering toward graphene oxide based smart drug delivery system for tumor mitochondria-targeting photodynamic therapy.

Targeted drug delivery. A smart system which has Switch on Switch off photo-toxicity towards the tumour gene or tumour mitochondria. You can switch on and switch off the trigger.

2028: There was no time as now when agriculture was so vital for the survival of mankind. With extreme climate changes in recent years predicting weather changes has been a nightmare. Temperature fluctuation prediction, quality of air, pollution percentage and air composition sensors are selling by the millions. Placed over millions acres of farmable land these sensors provide vital information that can be the difference between good crop, bad crop and no crop. Sensitive, accurate and predictable farming.

Graphene temperature and air quality sensors.

2026: The sensors detect gas. The alarms goes off. A terrorist attack. The army has cordoned off the area. It’s a theater. Hundreds of theater lovers are trapped. Quick evacuation of the theater is possible and all lives are saved just coz the sensor detected the minutest quantity of chemical gas.

Ultrasensitive graphene gas sensors.

2030: The auditorium is buzzing. The lighting gives it a metallic hue. Executives mingle with kids and the excitement is palpable. Deep Grey and Edison the two supercomputers are placed edge to edge. But that’s where the comparison ends. Deep Grey is far ahead. Its speed of calculation, analysis and processing is multiple times that of Edison.

Graphene embedded computer chips.

Graphene makes the world magical.

It is the stuff tech legends are made of. It was around us all the while and we didn’t know until one fine day the world woke up to the first 2D material – graphene.

In 2004 Andre and Novoselov brought graphene into existence. They were awarded the Nobel prize in physics for isolating graphene from graphite.

The one atom thick, two-dimensional crystal.

200 times tougher than steel, but so light and so flexible it is bendable.

At one million times smaller than the diameter of a human hair it is the world’s thinnest material.

It is transparent.

A very fine electrical and thermal conductor.

As a barrier it does not allow even helium to pass through.

Mix and match and combine these features and you can well imagine the myriad uses of graphene to human kind. That will change our world.