美国科学家发现新物质“比钻石还硬”

There is a new substance that is harder than diamond. It's called Q-carbon, and it was created by researchers at North Carolina State University.

北卡罗莱纳州立大学的研究人员研发出一种名为“Q-碳”的新物质，其硬度比钻石还高。

"The only place it may be found in the natural world would be possibly in the core of some planets," Jay Narayan, lead author on the papers describing the work, said in a statement.

研究论文的第一作者杰伊·纳拉杨在声明中说：“自然界中，可能也就只有在某些行星的内核处能找到这种物质了。”

Before its discovery, there were two distinct forms of solid carbon: graphite and diamond. Q-carbon is not only harder than diamond, but also glows when exposed to low levels of energy. That could make it very useful for creating strong, bright screens for electronic devices.

该物质被发现前，固体碳只有两种不同形态：石墨和钻石。Q-碳不仅硬度比钻石高，处于低能量状态下还能发光。这种特性使它尤其适用于制造电子设备坚硬、明亮的显示屏。

Researchers created the Q-carbon by blasting material covered in amorphous carbon (i.e. carbon without a crystalline structure) with a single laser pulse.

要想生成Q-碳，研究人员需利用单脉冲激光冲激材料表面的无定形碳（即无晶体结构的碳）。

They can cool the material to create either Q-carbon or tiny diamonds. Those diamonds could be used to build things such as microneedles for medical use, or electronics that can withstand extremely high temperatures for other industries.

然后将材料冷却，即可得到Q-碳或碎钻。这种钻石可以用来制作医用微型针头，或是用来制造能耐极端高温的工业电子元件。

"And it is all done at room temperature and at ambient atmosphere — we're basically using a laser like the ones used for laser eye surgery," Narayan said. "So, not only does this allow us to develop new applications, but the process itself is relatively inexpensive."

“这一系列过程都是在室温和普通的大气环境下完成的，我们所用的激光也和眼部激光手术用的那种差不多，”纳拉杨说道。“因此，我们不仅能继续研发这种物质的新用途，而且研发成本也相对低廉。”

Vocabulary

graphite：石墨

microneedle：显微操作针