By repetitive dividing and merging of laminar flows within complex patterns of narrow (25–40 µm) channels, static micromixers are very efficient at making homogeneous mixtures. However, the narrow channels are susceptible to clogging, and the cost to precisely manufacture the…
Cellulose accounts for about 40% of the planet’s total photosynthesis yield (about 1.8 trillion m.t./yr), but the material has not been fully utilized as a chemical resource so far. That’s because the methods currently available for converting cellulose into useful…
ExxonMobil Chemical Technology Licensing LLC (Houston, Tex.; edlinks.chemengonline.com/6518-541) has commercialized its new Olgone technology, a catalyst-based process for removing olefins from aromatic streams. If not removed, such olefinic materials interfere with downstream equipment, adsorbents, sieves and catalysts, says the company.…
Last September, construction commenced on the world's first commercial-scale hydrogen peroxide, propylene oxide (HPPO) plant at the Antwerp, Belgium, site of BASF AG (Ludwigshafen, Germany; edlinks.chemengonline.com/6518-542). The 300,000 m.t./yr facility is a joint venture of BASF and Dow Chemical Co.…
The fortunes of many an industrial sector have risen and fallen in the face of fluctuating oil and gas prices. Today, the industrial gas industry’s fortunes are being buoyed — in a roundabout way — by the…
Chemists at Boston College (Chestnut Hill, Mass.; edlinks.chemengonline.com/6517-546) have discovered a silylation catalyst that attaches a silicon atom to an alcohol group not only with high selectivity, but also in such a way that only one enantiomer is formed. Silyation…
Researchers from 34 institutions from around the world have completed the first DNA sequence for a tree, the black cottonwood or Populus trichocarpa (poplar). This poplar's rapid growth and relatively compact genome size (480 million nucleotide units, or 1/40th as…
Plant physiologist Cynthia Henson and colleagues at the ARS Cereal Crops Research Unit (Madison, Wisc.; edlinks.chemengonline.com/6517-552) have designed three thermophilic barley enzymes, which perform exceptionally well at around 70°C. As a result, the enzymes can yield up to 30% more…
Since its introduction to the market in 1959, chlorinated polyvinyl chloride (better known as CPVC) has proven suitable for use in a wide variety of chemical process environments. Because it is inert to most mineral acids, bases, salts…
Construction is underway on what is said to be the world's largest hydrogen chloride recycling plant, for Bayer MaterialScience AG (BMS; Leverkusen, Germany; edlinks.chemengonline.com/6517-536). When the unit starts up in 2008 at the Shanghai, China site, it will produce 215,000…