Graphene Week 2022: celebrations kick off for 10 years of Graphene Flagship

by Virginia Greco

This year’s edition of the Graphene Week (5-8 September, Munich) not only presented new developments in research and applications of graphene and related materials, but also had a note of celebration, as the Graphene Flagship has just turned 10.

The 2022 edition of the Graphene Week, annual appointment dedicated to graphene and related materials organised by the EU Graphene Flagship, was held in Munich (Germany) from 5 to 8 September. Set in the world-famous BMW Welt museum and exhibition centre, this multidisciplinary event gathered experts in the field who presented and discussed recent advances in graphene and 2D material research, as well as newest applications.

The conference was opened with a plenary talk on ‘2D empty space and its exotic properties’ by Nobel Prize Laurate and professor at the University of Manchester, Sir Andre Geim, who was awarded the 2010 Nobel Prize in Physics jointly with Prof. Konstantin Novoselov for his work on graphene. The programme comprised various parallel sessions, dedicated to Fundamentals, Processing, and Applications, intercalated with other thematic or satellite meetings, as well as an industrial exhibition and a poster session.

Since the Graphene Flagship has entered its tenth year, this edition of the Gaphene Week included talks and discussions bringing up success stories of collaboration, research and innovation which were fostered by the Flagship. A Graphene Innovation Forum was dedicated to technology transfer and commercialization of applications enabled by graphene and related materials, with perspectives and new trends discussed from both start-ups and larger corporations standpoints.

Special sessions were also dedicated to the European Chips Act, launched by the European Commission in February 2022 to strengthen Europe's competitiveness and resilience in semiconductor technologies and applications, to Diversity in Graphene, and to EU-US Research Collaborations to facilitate scientific exchanges and enhance synergies within the community.

Various members of the ICN2, from the Advanced Electronic Materials and Devices Group, the Theoretical and Computational Nanoscience Group, the Nanobioelectronics and Biosensors Group and the Business and Innovation Area, attended and/or contributed talks and posters to the conference. Among them was ICREA Prof. José Antonio Garrido, who gave a keynote talk on “Opportunities and challenges of graphene neurotechnology in neuroscience and medical applications”.

Photo: A part of the ICN2 delegation that participated in the Graphene Week 2022. From left to right: María Del Pilar Bernícola García, Fikret Taygun Duvan, Prof. José Antonio Garrido, Andrés Cano De la Fuente, Prof. Stephan Roche, Dr Ruslán Álvarez Diduk, Enric Calucho Palma, Michal Prokop.