Carbon, on the list of most abundant element in nature, has the capability to be combined chemically with itself and with other components by sturdy covalent bonds resulting in a selection of structures that allow the development of sources of Distinctive properties. The carbon supplies is often very solid as diamond or graphite as effortlessly delaminated, quite dense, higher strength (composite components carbon / carbon), and therefore suitable for structural applications (aircraft and racing automobiles), or quite porous (activated carbon); the latter getting beneficial as adsorbents for power storage or as a help for catalysts. They're able to be Very conductive (graphite) or insulating (vitreous carbon). This broad spectrum of properties is reinforced by the fact that only carbon sources are capable of operating at extreme temperatures within the most intense circumstances.

The carbon supplies have already been gathered a great deal interest with all the discovery of fullerenes and nanotubes. On the other hand, traditional carbon supplies have played an principal part considering that prehistoric period (pigment in cave paintings, a component of gunpowder, writing) and have contributed to the manufacturing and technological development of our society (steel).

The discovery of carbon fibers in the '60s, with its eminent strength and flexibility, was a major achievement within the development of those materials. In parallel, we uncover the vitreous carbon, named right after filing a conchoidal fracture surface, with properties analogous to glass, very strong and brittle. In the very same time, the discovery of brand new structural forms of graphitic carbon, needle and spherules, ostensibly contributed to the development of new carbon Materials for extremely diverse applications.

The outstanding biocompatibility of carbon components, revealed within the 70s, its service in prostheses, ligaments and heart valves, amongst others.

Inside the early '80s, the improvement of machinery for producing blocks of high-level density isotropic graphite permitted its application in high temperature reactors, in devices of synthesis of semiconductor crystals and to components of electric discharge electrodes. At mid-80s, the introduction of carbon fibers in civil engineering, architectural systems (buildings, bridges) together with the discovery of fullerenes.

Within the 90s, was discovered nanotubes, opening a modern era for carbon supplies: The era of your nanostructure. It is not only the world of carbon graphite flat structures or three-dimensional sort diamond, but we are now with closed structures containing pentagons of carbon atoms and carbon tubes with diameters in the nanometer scale, created of a sheet plain curved carbon atoms in hexagonal distribution. The discovery of carbon nanotubes of a single wall (single) and several wall, stimulated the fascination of scientists and engineers in fields linked to nanotechnology. In the very same time, new applications from the supplies in the loved ones of graphite, like anode materials for Li-ion battery rechargeable carbon fiber water refining, activated carbon electrodes for electric double layer supercapacitors, and so forth. .