Liquid phase exfoliation has been proved to be a cheap, scalable method for the mass production of 2D sheets. This talk will first discuss the galaxy of existent layered materials, with emphasis on synthesis, liquid-phase exfoliation, and characterization, focusing on some key applications recently developed in our laboratories, ranging from energy storage to printed electronics. We will for example discuss how two-dimensional nanomaterials can be formulated in aqueous and organic viscous inks for extrusion printing, inkjet printing, and aerosol jet 3D printing, and demonstrate direct printing on various substrates. The additive- and binary solvent-free inks do not show coffee ring effect, enabling high-resolution printing without substrate pre-treatment. The resulting printed micro-supercapacitors showcase excellent charge storage performance, including areal capacitance up to 100 mF/cm2 and volumetric capacitance up to 800 F/cm3 in protic gel electrolyte, coupled with long lifetime and good flexibility. The versatile direct-ink-printing technique highlights the promise of 2D nanomaterials functional inks for scalable fabrication of easy-to-integrate components of printable electronics. In this talk we will also demonstrate how such inks can be used to develop novel nanomaterials-based battery solutions.Increasing the energy storage capability of batteries necessitates maximization of their areal capacity. This requires thick electrodes performing at near-theoretical specific capacity. However, achievable electrode thicknesses are restricted by mechanical instabilities, with high-thickness performance limited by the attainable electrode conductivity. Here we show that forming a segregated network composite of carbon nanotubes with a range of lithium storage materials (for example, silicon, graphite, and metal oxide particles) suppresses mechanical instabilities by toughening the composite, allowing the fabrication of high-performance electrodes with thicknesses of up to 800 μm. Such composite electrodes display conductivities up to 1 × 104 S m−1 and low charge-transfer resistances, allowing fast charge-delivery and enabling near-theoretical specific capacities, even for thick electrodes. The combination of high thickness and specific capacity leads to areal capacities of up to 45 and 30 mAh cm−2 for anodes and cathodes, respectively. Combining optimized composite anodes and cathodes yields full cells with state-of-the-art areal capacities (29 mAh cm−2) and specific/volumetric energies (480 Wh kg−1 and 1,600 Wh l−1)..

Figure 1: Printed devices based on MXenes inks

We introduce a new approach to blood-based diagnostics where large blood volumes can be rapidly dried, resulting in inactivation of the inhibitory components in blood. In this approach thermal treatments generate a physical microscale and nanoscale fluidic network inside the dried matrix to allow access to target nucleic acid. High heme background is confined to the solid phase, while amplicons are enriched in the clear supernatant (liquid phase), giving fluorescence change comparable to purified DNA reactions. We demonstrate single-molecule sensitivity using a LAMP reaction in our platform and detect a broad spectrum of pathogens, including MRSA, MSSA, E.Coli and Candida albicans from whole blood with a limit of detection of 1.2 CFU/mL in <2.5 h.