To register for your free place at this event, email Katie Weeks (k.weeks@imperial.ac.uk)
For all media enquiries please contact Simon Levey (s.levey@imperial.ac.uk)
When you write with a pencil, you leave thin flakes of graphite on the paper. Some of these are less than a nanometer thick, and can be thought of as individual atomic planes cleaved away from the bulk of the pencil tip. This two dimensional material is called graphene, and was thought not to exist in the free state until it was discovered in 2004.
It now turns out that graphene is just one of a whole class of two-dimensional crystals. Its unusual electronic properties combined with the possibility of chemical modification make it a promising candidate for future electronic applications. By stacking layers of graphene and other two-dimensional crystals with different insulating, conducting and magnetic properties we may be able to develop new materials on demand that could revolutionise the telecommunications and electronics industries.
Explore more about graphene with Imperial’s material scientists during the drinks reception that follows the lecture.
Biography
Professor Sir Kostya Novoselov was born in Russia in August 1974. He completed his PhD at the High Magnetic Field Laboratory at the University of Nijmegen, Netherlands, in 2004 and joined the University of Manchester as a Leverhulme Research Fellow in 2005. He currently holds the position of Royal Society Research Fellow at the University of Manchester.
He was awarded the 2010 Nobel Prize in Physics, along with Professor Andre Geim, for his pioneering work on the two-dimensional carbon material graphene, and received a knighthood in the 2011 New Year Honours.
Professors Geim and Novoselov have published numerous research papers in prestigious journals such as Science and Nature. Their research demonstrates the potential use of graphene in novel applications such as transistors just one atom thick, ultrafast photodetectors for telecommunications and sensors that can detect just a single molecule of a toxic gas.
About the Kohn lecture
The Kohn Lecture is presented annually by a distinguished speaker from an area of science for which Nobel and other international prizes are awarded.
Speakers are selected by the Kohn Lecture Advisory Board, which comprises:
- Sir Keith O’Nions FRS, Rector, Imperial College London (Chairman)
- Sir Ralph Kohn FRS, The Kohn Foundation
- Sir Aaron Klug OM FRS, University of Cambridge
- The Lord Krebs FRS, Principal, Jesus College, Oxford
- Sir Paul Nurse PRS, Director, Francis Crick Institute
The lecture series is generously sponsored by the Kohn Foundation, which was established in 1991 by Sir Ralph Kohn as a registered charity providing financial support for scientific and medical research, educational purposes, musical and other artistic activities, as well as humanitarian aid.