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Meet the crystal growers who sparked a revolution in graphene electronics

Two Japanese scientists supply hundreds of laboratories with a prized gem — and are now among the world’s most published researchers.
  1. Mark Zastrow

    1. Mark Zastrow is a writer based in Seoul.

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Takashi Taniguchi prepares the 30,000 ton press to make a new batch of hexagonal boron nitride crystals.

Takashi Taniguchi with his crystal-making hydraulic press at the National Institute of Materials Science in Tsukuba, Japan. Credit: Mark Zastrow

The smell of acrid metal fills the air as Takashi Taniguchi reaches into the core of one of the world’s most powerful hydraulic presses. This seven-metre-tall machine can squeeze carbon into diamonds — but they aren’t on its menu today. Instead, Taniguchi and his colleague Kenji Watanabe are using it to grow some of the most desired gems in the world of physics.

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Nature 572, 429-432 (2019)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-019-02472-0

Updates & Corrections

  • Correction 02 October 2019: An earlier version of this story erroneously stated that Pablo Jarillo-Herrero was a student of Philip Kim.

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