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Share your thoughts with the GOgraphene Team!

Posted by John Page · October 31, 2016

Have you got any feedback for the GOgraphene team?

The GOgraphene webshop was launched by William Blythe Ltd just over two months ago to sell research scale quantities of graphene oxide. William Blythe was founded over 150 years ago and at the heart of its success is understanding our customers’ needs and actively building on any feedback received.

Listening to customers’ thoughts is undoubtedly key to GOgraphene being able to offer the best graphene oxide it can for its customers. It is also a priority for the team to gain an understanding of how GOgraphene’s customers are using the graphene oxide they purchase. The variety of applications which graphene oxide is being researched in is vast. This means that there are multiple avenues the GOgraphene team could explore at any one time. To make sure we are collecting data on the properties which are the most relevant for your research and potential applications please get in touch and let us know what you are working on. Your comments on the graphene oxide applications of most interest to you will help the team decide what they should look at next.

If you have any feedback for the GOgraphene team, please get in touch via the enquiry form. Comments on the content of the site, your experience of the ordering process, the packaging and how you found any material purchased will be gladly received. All comments will be reviewed by the team for future improvements and additions to the site. The result of your feedback could lead to additional characterisation of our current products, new product lines or additional content on the site.

We look forward to hearing from you!

Graphene Oxide Dispersion Success!

Posted by John Page · October 17, 2016

Graphene oxide has the potential to be a beneficial additive in many areas of research. A key step in this work is dispersing the graphene oxide in the system under investigation. How well the material disperses will depend on the medium used, because of the oxygen groups across the surface of graphene oxide it is reported to disperse better in polar solvents than graphene.

At the moment, GOgraphene sells graphene oxide as both aqueous dispersions and freeze dried powders. The powders were added to the product range to allow researchers to use GOgraphene's graphene oxide in non-aqueous systems (watch a video of our Graphene Oxide dispersions dispersing in water). “Non-aqueous” clearly covers a large number of media and the GOgraphene team wanted to learn more about which solvents their graphene oxide powder would disperse in.

From experience the GOgraphene team know how easily their graphene oxide powder disperses in water and based on available literature they knew that graphene oxide should disperse well in many polar solvents. To find out if GOgraphene's graphene oxide powder disperses as well in other polar solvents as it does in water, the team decided to put it to the test.
GOgraphene graphene oxide dispersions
Using water, dimethylformamide (DMF), isopropyl alcohol (IPA) and ethylene glycol, 0.5 mg/mL graphene oxide dispersions were prepared using GOgraphene's freeze dried graphene oxide powder. The dispersions were left in an ultrasonic bath for 3 hours at ambient temperature and the results are shown in the picture above. The freeze dried powder dispersed well in all 4 solvents - another success for the GOgraphene team!

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graphene oxide dispersions

GOgraphene Are Now Members Of The Graphene Council

Posted by John Page · September 30, 2016

The Graphene Council is the world’s largest community for graphene professionals. Bringing together experts from around the world, conducting market surveys and working to influence industry standards for graphene, The Graphene Council is working hard to support the commercialisation of graphene based products.

Graphene as a commercial material is still very much in its infancy. The nature of this means there are currently no industry defined standards for the various advanced materials which sit under the graphene umbrella. Those purchasing materials from different suppliers are likely to have noticed variation in the material they receive; one supplier is not necessarily better than the other in all applications, but slightly different benefits may be observed with material from different manufacturers. Establishing an industry standard is therefore a key step which the graphene market is currently missing. The process of establishing formal standards can be long, leaving the industry two options – continue with no change while waiting for the formal standards to be introduced or work to define its own informal standards for use in the meantime. William Blythe is keen to work in the second of these categories, ensuring that the material supplied is meeting both the needs and expectations of the graphene market.

Becoming a member of The Graphene Council allows the GOgraphene team to help influence the standards being developed for graphene derivatives alongside gaining insights into the graphene market, from both a commercial and applications perspective. The team are convinced this membership will work as a partnership, with information and support flowing between William Blythe and The Graphene Council to advance the commercialisation of graphene oxide as efficiently and effectively as possible.

AFM analysis on GOgraphene Graphene Oxide

Posted by John Page · September 19, 2016

AFM (atomic force microscopy) analysis has now been completed on GOgraphene graphene oxide. The AFM analysis was carried out to investigate both the lateral sheet dimensions and sheet depth, with the intention of discovering how many layers GOgraphene graphene oxide flakes are.

Diluting a sample of our 10 mg/mL aqueous graphene oxide dispersion down to a 1 ppm dispersion, it has been possible to measure the graphene oxide sheet sizes. The high dilution allows the AFM to measure fully dispersed material, without the individual flakes overlapping and consequently leading to more accurate dimensions for fully dispersed sheets.

The lateral dimensions of the plates varied, with the majority of flakes consistently over 5 microns in at least one lateral dimension. This corresponds very well with the SEM images obtained previously which showed lateral dimensions of over 5 microns. While there is currently no industry standard for understanding what the optimal graphene oxide sheet size is, GOgraphene graphene oxide is manufacturing a consistent quality product.

The AFM analysis is of particular interest for understanding the sheet depth. Single layers of graphene oxide are just over 1 nm tall, with greater depths informing the analyst approximately how many layers are stacked on top of one another. A few sheets stacked on top of one another can indicate that the graphene oxide is not fully dispersed into monolayers or that the graphite was not completely oxidised to enable all single layers to form. The AFM analysis on GOgraphene graphene oxide has shown a sheet depth of around 2 nm, proving that the individual flakes are only two graphene oxide sheets tall.

GOgraphene AFM analysis

This is an exciting new piece of data for the GOgraphene range which really proves the 2 dimensional nature of graphene oxide. Data collection on our graphene oxide will continue over the coming months, however if there is analysis on our products which isn’t listed on our site yet and you feel it would benefit your research, please get in touch via our enquiry form and we will look into this.

GOgraphene graphene oxide AFM analysis

GOgraphene online store proving popular within first month of launch!

Posted by John Page · September 05, 2016

Did you know GOgraphene, the William Blythe webshop dedicated to sales of graphene oxide has now been open for a month?

Graphene oxide is an exciting two dimensional material with a multitude of applications including its use as a graphene precursor. Global research in graphene oxide has boomed since the discovery of graphene oxide about a decade ago, with commercial applications just starting to take shape.
As an advanced materials manufacturer, William Blythe was eager to get involved with a 2 dimensional material which some predict will revolutionise products from electronics to engineering polymers. Within the first 6 months of product development William Blythe had a scalable and repeatable synthesis route which has since been refined and optimised into the method we use today.
Understanding that the majority of people currently interested in graphene oxide are researchers across a wide range of fields, William Blythe decided to focus on a graphene oxide range which is of maximum advantage for researchers in all applications. This led to the high concentration dispersions and freeze dried powders offered in the GOgraphene range, both developed to offer the best dispersions with the minimum sonication.
William Blythe has the capability to scale up the manufacture of graphene oxide to tonnage quantities and the Business Managers are handling all large volume sales, alongside the rest of the William Blythe product portfolio. The GOgraphene webshop was launched last month to enable the researchers William Blythe developed their graphene oxide for to buy at the quantities and prices suitable to their work, and already proving to be a popular destination even within the first few weeks of launching.

To find out more, or if you have any questions about the GOgraphene range please don’t hesitate to get in touch via our enquiry form.