00:03gold leaf that edible stuff they put on food to make it pricier and more luxurious is super thin
00:08but it's got nothing on this this is a scanning transmission microscopy image of what is essentially
00:14a new form of gold a material that is only one atom thick it has now been dubbed goldine because
00:19it turns out if you reduce gold down to a single atom in width it acts very similarly to graphene
00:24with material scientist shun kashawaya saying about it quote as you know gold is usually a metal but
00:30if single atom layer thick the gold can become a semiconductor instead experts say that getting
00:35gold into a 2d form factor has long been a challenge as its particles have a tendency to bunch up
00:41on
00:41their own and that's why the creation of goldine was sort of an accident as well with the researchers
00:45simply wanting to coat titanium silicon carbide with gold instead the gold replaced the silicon
00:51layer when it was exposed to high heat leaving just gold interlaced with titanium and carbon
00:55meaning all they had to do was use metal etching acid to remove the remaining titanium and carbon
01:00atoms in the end leaving a single layer of gold at the atomic level
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