For several years The Trend Curve has been keeping track of one of the most exciting materials development in history, graphene, and now a company in the UK has created a unique line of graphene-infused paints that are available now.
What is graphene? It’s a tiny, thin layer of pure carbon laid out in a tightly packed layer of carbon atoms, bonded together in a hexagonal honeycomb lattice. It’s the thinnest compound yet known and here is the good part: it is 200 times stronger than structural steel and conducts both thermal and electricity. Graphene’s applications are limitless and we’ve been excited to see which ones for home décor emerges first and reaches scale.
The Graphene Company, a UK-based organization, has just released graphene-infused paint containing the world’s “thinnest, strongest and most conductive” substance. It is available for sale now and has many unique properties:
“Graphene’s inclusion in paints, coatings and other building materials exponentially enhances hardness, durability, compression, tensile strength, elasticity and coverage. It reduces the weight of materials and delivers significant savings in materials consumption, maintenance, manpower and costs.“
Graphenstone paints are derived from raw natural mineral limestone. The porous nature of Graphenstone’s lime and graphene-infused coatings ensures that walls can still breathe. This improves air quality, reduces room humidity, acts against moisture collection and condensation, and contributes to safe and healthy environments.
The company’s produces over 1000 colors of highly sustainable and ecologically-friendly coatings available for both indoor and outdoor new build or restoration projects, so the availability of a wide color gamut for these new paints should be forthcoming.
While there was no mention by the company about how or if the electrical conductivity of graphene in their paint might be used, there are already hints at what a graphene-infused paint might bring to the world.
Graphene is lightweight, strong, very flexible and, as already mentioned, can conduct electricity. As such there have already been breakthroughs in using graphene to make smart, printed electronics. In addition, smart textiles are already emerging — especially in the health area as evidenced by this article and that Apple recently purchased a sleep-tracking company — so we’ve reached out to The Graphene Company to inquire about any research and development they may be doing to extend this new paint for making walls smarter (e.g., transmit signals from a hub to a smart device; turn lighting on and off; trigger ambient lighting behind picture frames).
We’ll keep an eye out in this graphene-application space. To learn more about this new paint line from The Graphene Company, read their press release here and visit their website here.
Images via The Graphene Company