Mar

31

Using Protein and Bacteria to Make Renewable Petroleum

March 31, 2011 | 1 Comment

University of Minnesota researchers, with a breakthrough from graduate student Janice Frias of figuring out how to use a protein to transform fatty acids produced by bacteria into ketones that can be cracked to make hydrocarbon fuels has the university filing patents on the process. The ink is barely dry. U of M researchers have [...]

Mar

30

A Nano Crystal Idea for Fuel Cells

March 30, 2011 | 2 Comments

Researchers at TU Delft have identified a new huge potential of nanocrystals in fuel cells.  The Delft researchers are the first to document the idea accurately with their second article on the subject. The latest paper was published in the scientific journal, Advanced Functional Materials. The addition of the extremely small nanocrystals to a solid [...]

Mar

29

Half of Artificial Photosynthesis Invented

March 29, 2011 | 11 Comments

The American Chemical Society press release headline runs, “Debut of the first practical “artificial leaf””, which is a little more than some extra on what has happened.  The prolific and wide ranging skills of Dr. Daniel Nocera have come up with an “artificial leaf” of sorts.   By that they mean Dr. Nocera has built a [...]

Mar

28

The Lithium Air Battery Makes Progress

March 28, 2011 | Leave a Comment

The research team at Japan’s National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST) can show heat-treated metal-free graphene nanosheets (GNS) have much more stable cycling performance in a Lithium-air battery. This might be important and does show a research lead, because of lithium air’s capacity of 5-10 times that of standard Lithium-ion batteries.  That [...]

Mar

25

Competition for Platinum Catalysts in Fuel Cells

March 25, 2011 | 3 Comments

Liming Dai, a professor of chemical engineering and research associates Shuangyin Wang and Dingshan Yu at Case Western Reserve University found that by simply soaking carbon nanotubes in a water solution of the polymer polydiallyldimethylammoniumn chloride for a couple of hours, the polymer coats the nanotube surface and pulls an electron partially from the carbon, [...]

Mar

24

A New Engine Driven By Shock Waves

March 24, 2011 | 5 Comments

Norbert Müller at Michigan State University in East Lansing has developed a prototype engine using a shock wave from the air/fuel valve closure compressing the mixture to ignition to drive a disk or rotor. Müller presented the new engine last week at a meeting organized by the US Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency [...]

Mar

23

A New Way to Get Oil Out of Sand

March 23, 2011 | 5 Comments

An absolute nemesis for both the environmentalist and the oil producer is oil in sand.  Whether its oil soaking into the beach or billions of barrels in sand reservoirs, getting oil out of sand is a very big idea.  Now Penn State researchers seem to have a new and very workable solution. A new, more [...]

Mar

22

A New Battery Structure Revolution for Better Performance

March 22, 2011 | 3 Comments

Professor Paul Braun has been leading a research group at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign reporting a significant breakthrough in the development of battery technology.  The research group has found a way to enable fast charging and discharging of electrical power while retaining high-energy storage capacity. Here’s the problem, rapidly charging and discharging rates [...]

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