• Graphene is a sheet of carbon, just one atom thick, recently produced in the lab in micron-sized areas, and with great promise as a starting point for new electronic devices [Meyer et al, Nature 446, p. 60 (2007)]
• The experimental samples were unexpectedly found to be rippled,  with bumps 20-200 Angstroms long and 10 Angstroms high.
• We propose that these ripples are due to small internal expansions of the graphene sheet caused by random attachment of impurities such as OH. The ripples are then due to the same basic mechanism that causes

We have also developed a theory for the fracture of graphene. It is published here Here is a movie of graphene fracturing..