Into a New Plane - Three-Dimensionally Delocalised Nano-Graphenes

石墨烯是纳米技术的基石材料，其在2004年的分离导致Geim和Novoselov在2010年获得诺贝尔物理学奖。石墨烯由一个原子厚的六边形排列的碳原子组成，这些碳原子共享电子以创建完全电子离域的表面。纳米石墨烯和相关的石墨烯纳米带是石墨烯的片段，其可以通过受控的化学合成产生。这具有有用的结果，例如可再现的合成和指示石墨烯的边缘结构的能力。控制这些材料的边缘结构是它们在拓扑绝缘体，有机太阳能电池和储氢等应用中的关键。该项目将建立石墨烯的新维度。它将产生独特的具有受控边缘结构的3D纳米石墨烯，这些纳米石墨烯是使用强大的“自下而上”合成途径合成的。与现有的平面纳米石墨烯和石墨烯纳米带相比，这将允许更大规模的合成和改善的溶解度。通过π-延伸或自组装方法，这些新的分子材料将被转化为分级纳米结构，以产生完全三维离域的超分子和大分子结构。这些新的纳米石墨烯及其组件的光电特性将使用先进的电子物理和电化学工具进行量化，并辅以电荷传输测量和计算见解。将这些功能特性与现有的2D纳米石墨烯和石墨烯纳米片本身进行比较，将在纳米技术中建立一个新的化学空间，并产生前所未有的新型分子材料。

Graphene is a cornerstone material in nanotechnology with its isolation in 2004 leading to the Nobel Prize in Physics for Geim and Novoselov in 2010. Graphene consists of a one-atom thick sheet of hexagonally arranged carbon atoms which share electrons to create a fully electronically delocalised surface. Nanographenes, and related graphene nanoribbons, are fragments of graphene which can be produced through controlled chemical synthesis. This has useful consequences such as reproducible synthesis and the ability to dictate the edge-structure structure of graphene. Controlling the edge-structure of these materials is key to their utility in applications including topological insulators, organic solar cells and hydrogen storage.This project will establish a new dimension in graphene, literally. It will yield unique 3D nanographenes with controlled edge-structure which are synthesised using robust "bottom-up" synthetic pathways. This will allow for synthesis on a larger scale and improved solubility compared to existing planar nanographenes and graphene nanoribbons. Through pi-extension or self-assembly methods these new molecular materials will be transformed into hierarchical nanostructures to produce fully three-dimensionally delocalised supramolecular and macromolecular constructs. The optoelectronic properties of these new nanographenes, and assemblies thereof, will be quantified using advanced photophysical and electrochemical tools complemented by charge transport measurements and computational insights. Benchmarking these functional properties against existing 2D nanographenes, and graphene nanoplatelets themselves, will establish a new chemical space in nanotechnology and produce unprecedented novel molecular materials.