Pressure-cooking birch leaves to produce raw material for organic semiconductors

Today, petrochemical compounds and rare metals such as platinum and iridium are used to produce semiconductors for optoelectronics, such as organic LEDs for super-thin TV and mobile phone screens. Physicists at Umeå University in collaboration with researchers in Denmark and China, have discovered a more sustainable alternative. By pressure-cooking birch leaves picked on the Umeå University campus, they have produced a nanosized carbon particle with desired optical properties.