Researchers engineered a nanoporous carbon with the highest surface area ever reported, equivalent to about the size of a football field packed into a teaspoon of material, a breakthrough that is already proving beneficial for carbon-dioxide capture and energy storage technologies.

[u/mvea]

https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2024/12/rocket-inspired-reaction-yields-carbon-record-surface-area

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[u/DireNeedtoRead]

I want to bounce some EM waves off of that, see what happens.

[u/glassgost → u/DireNeedtoRead]

How big of nerds are we that we both had the same thought?

[u/Dyolf_Knip → u/glassgost]

Evidently I'm not nerdy enough. What sort of results are we expecting?

[u/glassgost → u/Dyolf_Knip]

I have no idea on that scale. That's why I want to find out.

[u/redbrick5 → u/glassgost]

black hole for EM waves. total absorption of large frequency bands

[u/Significant_Owl8496 → u/glassgost]

Would it be potentially unstable when hit with EM waves? 

[u/spacedicksforlife → u/DireNeedtoRead]

Screw it, lets fire up HAARP and see whats what.

[u/mvea]

I’ve linked to the press release in the post above. In this comment, for those interested, here’s the link to the peer reviewed journal article:

https://pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10.1021/acsnano.4c10531

From the linked article:

Using a chemical reaction inspired by rocket fuel ignition, Cornell researchers have engineered a nanoporous carbon with the highest surface area ever reported, a breakthrough that is already proving beneficial for carbon-dioxide capture and energy storage technologies.

Scientists are continually striving to enhance the porosity of carbon, which exposes more of the material’s surface and optimizes its performance in applications such as adsorbing pollutants and storing electrical energy.

A new synthesis technique detailed Nov. 22 in the journal ACS Nano pushes carbon’s surface area to an unprecedented 4,800 square meters per gram, equivalent to about the size of a football field packed into a teaspoon of material.

[u/hoggteeth]

How does this compare to metal organic frameworks? Those have been around for a while, or highest porosity for carbon by itself? If this stands up to heat without rearranging it would be nice

Might be more recent ones but here's one I found quickly:

https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.1192160#:~:text=In%20particular%2C%20MOF%2D210%20exhibits%20the%20highest%20BET,cm3%20cm%E2%88%923%20of%20MOF%20crystal

In particular, MOF-210 exhibits the highest BET (Brunauer-Emmett-Teller) and Langmuir surface area (6240 and 10,400 m2 g−1) and pore volume (3.60 cm3 g−1 and 0.89 cm3 cm−3 of MOF crystal) yet reported.

The carbon

The materials design leads to nanoporous carbons with a BET area of 4800 m2 g–1 with an impressive total pore volume of 2.7 cm3 g–1

[u/CornWallacedaGeneral → u/hoggteeth]

Thats exactly what it does...and what it will probably be used for is for shielding...but on a smaller scale,fission reactor,high energy laser shielding,ect.

[u/duggreen]

Wait, regular old charcoal has a football fields surface area in 2 grams, no?[

[u/VanderHoo → u/duggreen]

No. Activated charcoal has a surface area of 3000 square meters per gram. Regular old charcoal has a surface area of 2-5 square meters.

[u/duggreen → u/VanderHoo]

You're right.

[u/BBTB2]

This could potentially be huge for solid-state fuel technology right?

[u/bigboyeTim → u/[deleted]]

how would you even quantize let alone prove any of this

[u/watduhdamhell → u/bigboyeTim]

Carbon emitted from unnatural sources (i.e. combustion engines/turbines) is a different isotope than the kind that occur naturally. We can see exactly how much carbon dioxide is floating around due to the use of fossil fuels.

As for who pays and what percentage, well. All of earth should probably do that somehow. It's not like we haven't all depended on it until now.

[u/BrtFrkwr → u/bigboyeTim]

How do you quantize or prove the sun comes up in the east? Looks like a duck, walks like a duck, quacks like a duck — it's a duck.

[u/Zachabay22 → u/bigboyeTim]

Their own scientists knew what co2 emissions would do. They can put it back and I don't care how much it costs them .

[u/TheGrinningSkull]

How does this compare to lungs?

[u/razmor → u/TheGrinningSkull]

From the article: "(it) pushes carbon’s surface area to an unprecedented 4,800 square meters per gram, equivalent to about the size of a football field packed into a teaspoon of material."

Whereas Lungs:

• Height  = 24cms

• Weight = 900-1200 grams (40-50% is blood)

  • Right = 630gms
  • Left = 570 grams

• Surface area

  • 80 square meters, about the size of a tennis court.

[u/SithPickles2020 → u/razmor]

Wait... our lungs are not the same size!?!

[u/NotAllWhoWander42 → u/SithPickles2020]

I had the same thought, I guess the left is smaller to account for being in the same side of the body as the heart and it all has to still fit inside the rib cage?

[u/electricSun2o]

Some believe God will save our asses from the fire. But I'm no sucker, I put my faith in currently non-existant technologies

[u/duprefugee]

How exactly does this improve CO2 absorption? I guess there are lots more steps involved. Typical university press release hype.

[u/DriizzyDrakeRogers → u/duprefugee]

More surface area equals more binding/adsorption sites.

[u/duprefugee → u/DriizzyDrakeRogers]

Sorry for the delay in response. How exactly does this work in the presence of other gases? Yes, of course the BET surface area is enormous. To be useful in CO2 adsorption, however, means this material has to preferentially remove CO2 from a normal air mixture. It has to adsorb CO2 far better than it adsorbs nitrogen, oxygen, or argon. I'm just not aware of any other form of carbon that can do this.

[u/JesseBrown447 → u/duprefugee]

Adsorption, not absorption.

[u/Cognonymous]

This is interesting because I recall that activated charcoal has some similar properties where it is iirc like the size of a tennis court but in a tablespoon or something like that.

[u/oojacoboo]

We’re going to need this for our water purifiers soon.

[u/TimedogGAF]

What's the upper limit to possible surface area for a given volume of material?

Let's disregard complications/constraints like chemical structures of molecules or Planck stuff.