As a material highly sensitive to the environment, graphene could act as a sensor with a single device measuring strain, gas, magnetism or pressure.

BBC: Is graphene really a wonder-material?

Whether such currents could act as earthquake predictors depends on whether there are changes in the strain on a fault before it slips.

ECONOMIST: Predicting earthquakes

This means that Dr Meredith's method can reach back into the distant past, and catch a glimpse of the act of cross-fertilisation between two different varieties of grapevine that created the strain that the cuttings have perpetuated.

ECONOMIST: Genetics