"MATERIALS: Graphene made magnetic with hydrogen coating"

Carbon sheets--graphene--can be made ferromagnetic, called graphone, by adjusting the amount of hydrogenation on their surface, according to these researchers. With an adjustable magnetic moment that can couple ferromagnetically, graphone allows the magnetism to be harnessed in semiconducting devices. Look for spintronic devices using graphone within 10 years. R.C.J.


Graphone, a new magnetic version of carbon monolayers called graphene, could enable a new breed of carbon spintronic devices, researchers claim. Graphene, consisting of pure crystalline carbon sheets, cannot be doped with impurities to adjust its semiconducting and magnetic properties as easily as silicon since carbon does not readily "heal" implantations with annealing. Rather than implanting dopants, researchers say, a surface treatment can be used to adjust a carbon sheet's properties. Researchers say hydrogen can be used to fine-tune graphene's metallic, semiconductor and magnetic properties, resulting in either graphene (metallic), graphane (semiconducting) or graphone (ferromagnetic).
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