Sigma-Aldrich (St. Louis, Mo.; edlinks.chemengonline.com/5829-550) has commercialized an air- and water-stable palladium catalyst for performing intermolecular cross-coupling reactions, aminations and intermolecular Heck transformations. The catalyst, developed by Professor Michael Organ at York University (Toronto, Canada), is based on a Pd-NHC…
Researchers at Penn State University’s (University Park, Pa.; edlinks.chemengonline.com/5829-551) Energy Institute are developing a jet fuel that is composed of at least 50% bituminous coal. The fuel, provisionally designated JP900, is comparable to Jet A or military JP 8, and…
BroadWare Technologies, Inc. (Santa Clara, Calif.; edlinks.chemengonline.com/5829-548) and Intergraph Corp. (Huntsville, Ala.; edlinks.chemengonline.com/5829-549) have created an integrated solution that feeds high-quality video from remote locations to a central command center to speed decisionmaking and response time when a security event…
Over the next four years, EnvoSmart Technologies B.V. (Roosendaal, Netherlands; edlinks.chemengonline.com/5829-533) plans to install 31 ThermoFuel systems throughout Europe for converting plastic waste into low-sulfur diesel fuel. The first six systems are to be located near Berlin, Germany, where they…
In Anaheim, Calif., last month at the Parenteral Drug Assn.’s annual meeting, Pall Corp. (East Hills, N.Y.; edlinks.chemengonline.com/5829-539) introduced Ascotec to the global market, a faster, more accurate system for detecting microbial contamination in clean-room air systems. When compared to…
It is now fairly well established that mass- and heat-transfer efficiency, reaction selectivity and yield can be improved using microreactor technology (CE, July 2001, pp. 27–35). But the small channel dimensions (below one square millimeter) that are responsible for the…
A new phosphoric acid that contains less than 100 parts per billion of 30 different metal ions is now commercially available from Febex S.A. (Box, Switzerland; edlinks.chemengonline.com/5828-539), the phosphorous specialties subsidiary of CECA Arkema Group (Paris). The new grade of…
Using a diamond anvil cell to create high (up to 50 GPa) pressures, and a laser to create high (up to 2,000 K) temperatures, researchers from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL; Calif.; edlinks.chemengonline.com/5828-543), the Carnegie Inst. of Washington, and the…
Sodium-ion monitoring can prevent steam-turbine corrosion Studies have shown that sodium is one of the most significant contributors to corrosion within turbines, and that such corrosion leads to cracking, embrittlement and ultimately, turbine failure. The Orion Ionplus 2111LL low-level sodium…
A heterogeneous catalyst for producing the solvent methyl isobutyl ketone has been developed by graduate student Ferry Winter, who defended his chemistry Ph.D. thesis last month at Utrecht University (Netherlands; edlinks.chemengonline.com/5827-550). The catalyst is based on activated hydrotalcite — a…