A High Power Optical Laser turns Plastic Bottles into Nanodiamonds

Researchers at the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory in California created nanodiamonds from the same PET material used to make plastic bottles

The research team was led by Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf (HZDR) and the University of Rostock in Germany, Ecole Polytechnic in France in collaboration with SLAC.

The researcher used a high-power optical laser in SLAC's linac coherent light source to temporarily heat a sample of polyethylene terephthalate (PET) plastic to 6,000°C (10,800°F). This created a pressure wave that compressed the material to millions of times atmospheric pressure for a few nanoseconds.

Past exploration made diamonds by compacting mixtures of hydrogen and carbon. Be that as it may, PET, which is ordinarily utilized for food and drink bundling, contains hydrogen and carbon, yet additionally oxygen. This makes it more suitable for icy giant planet configurations such as Neptune and Uranus. Kraus of the University of Rostock in Germany says oxygen appears to help diamond formation. "Oxygen sucks out hydrogen," he says, leaving behind carbon that can form nanodiamonds.

This new technique could potentially create nanodiamonds that can be more easily tailored for specific applications, such as B. A quantum device made of diamond with defects, such as some of the carbon atoms being replaced by nitrogen atoms.