US Patent Issued to Energy & Environmental Research Center on Oct. 7 for "Method of forming graphene quantum dots from coal" (North Dakota Inventors)

ALEXANDRIA, Va., Oct. 8 -- United States Patent no. 12,434,250, issued on Oct. 7, was assigned to Energy & Environmental Research Center (Grand Forks, N.D.).

"Method of forming graphene quantum dots from coal" was invented by Alexander Azenkeng (Grand Forks, N.D.) and Jason D. Laumb (Grand Forks, N.D.).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "Upgraded coal, method of forming the same, and graphene films and quantum dots made therefrom. A method of upgrading coal includes cleaning coal to form a cleaned coal residue. The method also includes (A) reacting the cleaned coal residue with an oxidizable inorganic metallic agent, or (B) reacting the cleaned coal residue with a reducing agent, or a combination t...