Prof. Sam S. Yoon at Korea University had already been working on a kinetic spray deposition system, that could apply liquids to a variety of materials by accelerating droplets to supersonic speeds via a de Laval nozzle. He was approached by the University of Illinois at Chicago's Prof. Alexander Yarin, who believed that the technology could be used for the application of graphene flakes suspended in a carrier liquid.

The result of their collaboration is a system that reportedly applies graphene to various substrates in a smooth, even layer. The liquid evaporates quickly, leaving behind a coating of well-distributed flakes that resist clumping together, but that also don't have any large empty spaces between them.