Nanocarbon black electrifies concrete, turns it into a heat radiator
Concrete is an electrical insulator but a sprinkle of nanocarbon allows electrons to flow.
MIT CSHub postdocs Nicolas Chanut and Nancy Soliman hold two of their conductive cement samples. Credit: Andrew Logan.
Concrete is such an indispensable construction material that humans invented it twice, more than a thousand years apart. The merit of concrete in supercharging our current infrastructure cannot be overstated, but a group of researchers at MIT still found a way to spice things up.
Normally, concrete is an electrical insulator. But the MIT researchers managed to make it conductive by doping the concrete mixture with nanocarbon black, a very cheap carbon-based material.
Credits: Photo: Andrew Logan Caption: By running current through this mortar sample made with nanocarbon-doped cement, Chanut and Soliman were able to warm it to 115 F (see thermometer display on the right). Credits: Photo: Andrew Logan Caption: Researchers tested the mechanical properties of their samples by using scratch tests. The results of the testing can be seen on the surfaces of the samples. Credits: Photo: Andrew Logan
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Since its invention several millennia ago, concrete has become instrumental to the advancement of civilization, finding use in countless construction applications from bridges to buildings
. And yet, despite centuries of innovation, its function has remained primarily structural.
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