Bipyrazole Organic Crystals: New Revolution in Science

By Aditi Verma|Updated : August 6th, 2021

In science, every day, we are looking at new developments. New technology, new methodology and new materials have become a part of our life. Looking into new materials, our Indian scientists have invented a new material that will soon make it possible for damaged electronic components to mend themselves, such as in space crafts. The materials, i.e. Bipyrazole Organic Crystals, recently developed by scientists, can repair their damages with the electrical charges produced by the mechanical impact. 

In science, every day, we are looking at new developments. New technology, new methodology and new materials have become a part of our life. Looking into new materials, our Indian scientists have invented a new material that will soon make it possible for damaged electronic components to mend themselves, such as in space crafts. The materials, i.e. Bipyrazole Organic Crystals, recently developed by scientists, can repair their damages with the electrical charges produced by the mechanical impact. 

Devices that we use daily in our daily life often tend to break down due to mechanical damage, like falling to the ground, push, jerk etc.,  forcing us to repair or replace them. These damages decrease the life of the equipment and increase their maintenance costs. In many cases, like in space crafts, human interference for repairing, restoration is not possible. 

A team formed by the researchers of the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research(IISER), Kolkata, and IIT Kharagpur have developed piezoelectric molecular crystals that can repair themselves from damages caused by mechanical force without any external interference. These piezoelectric crystals are hexagonal crystals that produce electricity whenever force is applied to them. Also, when an electromagnetic force is applied to crystals, they begin vibrating and display mechanical growth and reduction. This whole process is called the inverse piezoelectric effect. 

The piezoelectric molecules developed by scientists are called bipyrazole organic crystals. These crystals recombine themselves from any mechanical fracture without any external help. They independently heal themselves in milliseconds with crystallographic precision.

Due to the unique property of crystals through which they generate electrical charges on mechanical impact when the molecules are broken into pieces by a mechanical force, they generate electrical charges at the crack junction. These electrical charges lead to the production attraction in the damaged parts causing exact autonomous repair.

The Department of Science and Technology supported this research, GoI via Swarnajayanti Fellowship to CM Reddy. Also, Science and Engineering Research Board (SERB) research grants have been published in the ‘Science’  journal.

This methodology was, at first, developed by the IISER Kolkata team led by Prof. C Malla Reddy (recipient of the Swarnajayanti fellowship (2015) given by the Department of Science & Technology, Government of India), Prof. Nirmalya Ghosh of IISER Kolkata ( laureate of the Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE), G.G. Stokes Award in Optical polarisation 2021). They used a custom-designed state-of-the-art polarisation microscopic system to analyse and assess the perfection of the piezoelectric organic crystals. These materials are called “crystals” that consists of the perfect internal arrangement of molecules or ions and are found in abundance in nature. Ionic crystals are made up of ions bound together by electrostatic attraction.

 

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Prof. Bhanu Bhusan Khatua and Dr Sumanta Karan of IIT Kharagpur’s team studied the performance of the new materials for producing mechanical energy harvesting devices. 

In future, this material may find its way into high-end micro-chips, high precision mechanical sensors, actuators, micro-robotics and so on. Further research into these materials will lead to the development of smart electronic gadgets that may self-repair. It may prove to be an extensive development in the field of electronics.

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