▎ 摘　　要

After the 2010 Nobel Prize recognized the research breakthrough reported by our group in a 2004 paper, I feel that, as my contribution to the proceedings of the Nobel symposium held earlier in 2010, it is both appropriate and important to review pre-2004 scientific literature and acknowledge early ideas. With the benefit of hindsight, I also try to analyze why our first graphene paper has attracted so much interest.