For the first time, a team of scientists from the Georgia Institute of Technology and Columbia University (USA) has managed to demonstrate the piezoelectric properties of a material as flexible as graphene, generating electric current through mechanical deformations in molybdenum disulfide (MoS2). , resulting in the finest electrical generator ever achieved .
The study, which has been published in the journal Nature , explains that this material (found in nature in the mineral molybdenite) could be used to make microscopic electrical generators that could be inserted into clothing , transforming the energy of our movements into electricity. , thus being able to charge medical devices, portable sensors and, of course, the mobile.
"What is really interesting is that we have discovered that a material like MoS2, which is not piezoelectric in raw [three-dimensional] form, can become piezoelectric when it is reduced to a layer of atomic [two-dimensional] thickness," says Lei Wang, co-author of the study.
This new generation of materials of the future could have a multitude of interesting and striking applications, such as the aforementioned possibility of producing electricity without the need for an external source (through the energy of our body movement) or the design of highly efficient photovoltaic cells that were capable of absorbing a very wide range of solar energy.
