Latest News: Technologies
A better way to make efficient catalysts
A new procedure for making uniform, metallic nanoparticles has been developed by the research group of Kousuke Mori, an associate professor at Osaka University (www.mat.eng.osaka-u.ac.jp), with support from New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO; Kawasaki, both Japan). The…
Spinning yarns of CNTs
The exceptional properties of carbon nanotubes (CNTs), such as high tensile strength and high thermal and electrical conductivities, have suggested a number of applications, including lightweight materials for ballistics protection, actuators for muscles or artificial muscles, filaments for light sources,…
Alkaline-earth-based catalysts for C–C bond formation
Salts of alkaline-earth metals have been shown to catalyze reactions for the selective formation of carbon-carbon bonds, by chemistry professor Shu Kobayashi and colleagues at the University of Tokyo (www.chem.s.u-tokyo.ac.jp). The research, supported by the Japan Science and Technology Agency…
May Chementator Briefs
Wireless add-on ABB Instrumentation (Warminster, Pa.; www.abb.com/instrumentation) has made its entry into wireless communications technology with the WirelessHART upgrade adapter, previewed at ABB’s recent Automation & Power World. This adapter is used to connect existing HART transmitters that are wired…
Chementator: A palladium catalyst makes primary amines in aqueous NH3
Primary amines are made in high yield by a palladium-catalyzed allylic amination reaction developed by Shu Kobayashi, a chemistry professor at the University of Tokyo (Japan; www.chem.s.u-tokyo.ac.jp.). The reaction uses aqueous ammonia as the nitrogen source — the first time…
Chementator: Optical fiber sensing gets an NSF boost
Last January, Chiral Photonics, Inc. (Pine Brook, N.J.; www.chiralphotonics.com) was awarded $500,000 in a Small Business Technology Transfer Phase II grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF; Washington, D.C.). The grant will be used to develop a new optical-fiber-sensor platform…
Cut installation costs in half with this orifice flowmeter
ABB Instrumentation (Warminster, Pa.; www.abb.com/instrumentation) has cut the cost of installing orifice-plate flowmeters by up to half with the launch of its OriMaster compact orifice DP flowmeter. The latest in the company’s FlowMaster range, the OriMaster comes fully factory configured…
Chementator: EPA proposes national reporting system for greenhouse gases
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA, Washington D.C.) plans to set up the first U.S. national system for reporting emissions of CO2 and other greenhouse gases. The proposal marks the first step toward a program for climate control. "Through this…
April chementator briefs
Calibration-free pH The world’s first continuously self-calibrating pH measurement system was previewed at the Interphex show in New York last month by Sensorin (Burlingame, Calif; www.sensorin.com). According to the manufacturer, all currently available pH sensors including glass, optical and ion-selective…
Chementator: This new crystallizer reduces damage to larger crystals
With the exception of Oslo-type crystallizers, the main commercial crystallizers are agitated systems that use an agitator [agitated tank or draft-tube baffle (DTB)] or a circulation pump [forced circulation (FC) crystallizers]. In such systems, however, large crystals become damaged by…