Two Russian-born physicists working at the University of Manchester in England have won the Nobel prize in physics for investigating the remarkable properties of ultra-thin carbon flakes known as graphene.The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said Tuesday that Andre Geim, 51, and Konstantin Novoselov, 36, will split the prize money associated with the award of about 1.4 million dollars.
Graphene is a form of carbon in which the atoms are arranged in a flat hexagon lattice like microscopic chicken wire, a single atom thick. It is not only the thinnest material in the world, but also the strongest: a sheet of it stretched over a coffee cup could support the weight of a truck bearing down on a pencil point.
Dr. Geim, who was born in Sochi, Russia, and is now a Dutch citizen, studied at the Moscow Physical-Technical Institute and was awarded a Ph.D. at Institute of Solid State Physics in Chernogolovka in 1987.
The graphene creation originated in what Dr. Geim and Dr. Novoselov call “Friday evening” experiments, crazy things that might or might not work out.
Because of graphene’s structure, he explained, electrons moving through it do not act like the billiard balls of classic physics, bumping from atom to atom, but rather like waves moving at the speed of light.