That's interesting.
Quote:
In a similar style to old-fashioned film projectors, the laser arc method generates an arc between an anode and a cathode (the carbon) in a vacuum. The arc is initiated by a laser pulse on the carbon target. This produces a plasma consisting of carbon ions, which is deposited as a coating on the workpiece in the vacuum. To run this process on an industrial scale, a pulsed laser is vertically scanned across a rotating graphite cylinder as a means of controlling the arc. The cylinder is converted evenly into plasma thanks to the scanning motion and rotation. To ensure a consistently smooth coating, a magnetic field guides the plasma and filters out any particles of dirt.
The laser arc method can be used to deposit very thick ta-C coatings of up to 20 micrometers at high coating rates.
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You know what else you can make out of tetrahedrons? Bucky Fuller's Vector Equilibrium. Out of that you can make mountains and palaces on a nano scale. Or a flat plane. Or a cylinder that is circular down to atomic scale. Out of
plasma.
To paraphrase Dick Tracy, 'Whoever controls plasma controls the universe.' They're starting with piston rings and pins.
There's also this:
Spacecraft built from graphene could run on nothing but sunlight - space - 28 May 2015 - New Scientist
In addition to the solar sail now currently on orbit, research shows that graphene sheds electrons when hit by sunlight, producing a thrust increase over other sail materials.
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