Tracking high impact progress to the technology future, future technology and especially advanced nanotechnology, nuclear and energy technology, quantum computers, life extension, space technology and AI. Proposing and tracking the best societal, business and technical choices to the next big things that will shape our future. Official Lifeboat Foundation news source.
1. This image represents "copolymer micelles," tiny drug-delivery spheres that could be used in a new approach for repairing damaged nerve fibers in spinal cord injuries. The bottom graphs show data indicating damaged spinal cord tissue recovered its "action potential," or ability to transmit signals, after treatment with the micelles. (Credit: Purdue University's Weldon School of Biomedical Engineering)
Spinal cord injury results in immediate disruption of neuronal membranes, followed by extensive secondary neurodegenerative processes. A key approach for repairing injured spinal cord is to seal the damaged membranes at an early stage. Here, we show that axonal membranes injured by compression can be effectively repaired using self-assembled monomethoxy poly(ethylene glycol)-poly(d,l-lactic acid) di-block copolymer micelles. Injured spinal tissue incubated with micelles (60 nm diameter) showed rapid restoration of compound action potential and reduced calcium influx into axons for micelle concentrations much lower than the concentrations of polyethylene glycol, a known sealing agent for early-stage spinal cord injury. Intravenously injected micelles effectively recovered locomotor function and reduced the volume and inflammatory response of the lesion in injured rats, without any adverse effects. Our results show that copolymer micelles can interrupt the spread of primary spinal cord injury damage with minimal toxicity.
Scientists at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine report that regeneration of central nervous system axons can be achieved in rats even when treatment delayed is more than a year after the original spinal cord injury.
Regeneration Can Be Achieved After Chronic Spinal Cord Injury ScienceDaily (Oct. 31, 2009) — Scientists at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine report that regeneration of central nervous system axons can be achieved in rats even when treatment delayed is more than a year after the original spinal cord injury.
"The good news is that when axons have been cut due to spinal cord injury, they can be coaxed to regenerate if a combination of treatments is applied," said lead author Mark Tuszynski, MD, PhD, professor of neurosciences and director of the Center for Neural Repair at UC San Diego, and neurologist at the Veterans Affairs San Diego Health System. "The chronically injured axon is not dead."
While there are more than 10,000 new spinal cord injuries annually in the United States, nearly 250,000 patients are living in the chronic stages of injury. Yet nearly all previous spinal cord injury studies have attempted to stimulate regeneration when treatment is begun almost immediately after injury -- because, in part, scientists considered it very difficult to achieve regeneration at such long time points after injury. None had shown successful regeneration in the late, chronic stages.
Reporting in the October 29 issue of the Cell Press journal Neuron, the UC San Diego team demonstrated successful regeneration of adult spinal cord axons into, and then beyond, an injury site in the cervical spinal cord, the middle region of the neck. Treatment was begun at time periods ranging from six weeks to as long as 15 months after the original injury in rats.
A number of mechanisms create formidable barriers to regeneration of injured axons in chronic spinal cord injury. These include scar formation at the injury site, a partial deficiency in the intrinsic growth capacity of adult neurons, the presence of inhibitors to growth, and, sometimes, extensive inflammation. Chronically injured neurons show a loss of expression of regeneration-promoting genes, and there is progressive degeneration of spinal cord white matter beyond lesion sites -- all contributing to a poor environment for axonal re-growth.
Even under ideal laboratory circumstances, axonal re-growth is complex, requiring a combination of three things: a cellular bridge in the lesion site; a nervous system growth factor to guide axons to the correct target; and a stimulus to the injured neuron that turns on regeneration genes. Using this combinatorial treatment, the research team achieved axonal bridging beyond the original lesion site in rats when treatment was delayed for up to 15 months after the original spinal cord injury. Animals lacking the full combination treatment did not exhibit axonal regrowth
The enzyme, chrondroitinase ABC (chABC), must be supplied to the damaged area for at least two weeks following injury to fully degrade scar tissue. But the enzyme functions poorly at body temperature and must therefore be repeatedly injected or infused into the body.
In a paper published November 2 in the early edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers describe how they eliminated the thermal sensitivity of chABC and developed a delivery system that allowed the enzyme to be active for weeks without implanted catheters and pumps
* Electroville: High-Amperage Energy Storage Device-Energy Storage for the Neighborhood * Planar Na-beta Batteries for Renewable Integration and Grid Applications * Low Cost, High Energy and Power Density, Nanotube-Enhanced Ultracapacitors * Sustainable, High-Energy Density, Low-Cost Electrochemical Energy Storage - Metal-* Air Ionic Liquid (MAIL) Batteries * Silicon Coated Nanofiber Paper as a Lithium-Ion Anode * High Energy Density Lithium Batteries
Electroville: High-Amperage Energy Storage Device-Energy Storage for the Neighborhood
Scientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Cambridge, MA) will develop a paradigm shifting new "all liquid metal" grid scale battery for low cost, large scale storage of electrical energy. If this project is successful, this new class of batteries will allow the U.S. to regain technology leadership in grid scale energy storage and enable constant energy supply from intermittent renewable energy sources, such as wind and solar power, and will enable their widespread deployment on the U.S. grid to drastically reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Professor Sadoway’s “Liquid Metal Grid-Scale Batteries” project was described by DOE as a technology that “could revolutionize the way electricity is used and produced on the grid, enabling round-the-clock power from America's wind and solar power resources.” Sadoway’s proposal, funded at $6.9 million, would use low cost, domestically available liquid metals to store energy at grid-scale. When he learned of the award, Sadoway said, "This is fantastic news. These new funds will allow us to accelerate the rate of discovery.” He noted that the funds will “enable us to enlarge our team and to expand our collaboration with other researchers on campus. The addition of new and complementary skills to the project will help us move this novel energy storage concept to a reality.”
This granular stuff is the electrolyte, which is a molten salt, and you can see a second shiny zone at the bottom here, which is the second liquid layer, and it's self-assembled, self-separated; there's no divider, no separator here.
YOUNG: So when this heats up, these metals kind of sort themselves out because they're different densities, is that the deal?
SADOWAY: Exactly, you have two factors here: All three liquids are of different density, okay, and the second thing that's equally important, they're remissible just like oil and water because I don't want to put any separators in here. That's the virtue of it because it has no separator it's – wherever you have a solid in a battery, solid means slow diffusion.
This granular stuff is the electrolyte, which is a molten salt, and you can see a second shiny zone at the bottom here, which is the second liquid layer, and it's self-assembled, self-separated; there's no divider, no separator here.
YOUNG: So when this heats up, these metals kind of sort themselves out because they're different densities, is that the deal?
SADOWAY: Exactly, you have two factors here: All three liquids are of different density, okay, and the second thing that's equally important, they're remissible just like oil and water because I don't want to put any separators in here. That's the virtue of it because it has no separator it's – wherever you have a solid in a battery, solid means slow diffusion.
Planar Na-beta Batteries for Renewable Integration and Grid Applications
Eagle Picher (Joplin, MO), in partnership with the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, will develop a new generation of high energy, low cost planar liquid sodium beta batteries for grid scale electrical power storage applications. This new generation of batteries could vault the U.S. into global leadership in grid scale energy storage and enable continuous power from intermittent renewable resources, like wind and solar power, to allow them to be integrated into the U.S. grid in large quantities to drastically reduce greenhouse gas emissions while maintaining a highly stable and reliable grid.
Low Cost, High Energy and Power Density, Nanotube-Enhanced Ultracapacitors
FastCAP SYSTEMS (Cambridge, MA), in collaboration with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, will develop a game changing new nanotube enhanced ultracapacitor with potential for a 6x improvement in energy density and cost over the current industry state-of-the art. These novel energy storage devices have potential for energy densities approaching those of batteries (33-44 Wh/kg), while providing 20x higher power density and thousands of times the cycle life of existing high performance batteries. If successfully developed, this transformational new energy storage technology would greatly reduce the cost of hybrid and elecricelectric vehicles to enable their widespread cost effective deployment in the U.S. and dramatically reduce U.S. oil imports. This technology also holds great promise to enable continuous power from intermittent renewable resources, like wind and solar, to allow them to grow to a large fraction of grid power while maintaining a stable and highly reliable grid.
Arizona State University (Tempe, AZ), in partnership with Fluidic Energy, Inc., will seek to develop a new class of ultra-high energy new metal-air batteries using advanced ionic liquids. With a target energy density of 6-20 times that available state-of-the-art Li-ion batteries and at < 1/3 the cost, if this project is successful it will create a gamechanginggame changing new battery technology that will enable rapid and widespread deployment of long range, low cost plug-in hybrid and all-electric vehicles, shifting U.S. transport energy to the grid and drastically reducing U.S. oil imports.
Silicon Coated Nanofiber Paper as a Lithium-Ion Anode
Inorganic Specialists, Inc. (Miamisburg, OH), in partnership with Ultramet, Inc., Eagle Picher, Southeast Nonwovens, and the Edison Materials Technology Center, will develop ultra high capacity battery anodes for next generation Li-ion batteries (3x the state-of-the art) based on a novel low cost silicon-coated carbon nanofiber paper. If successful, this low cost manufacturable new battery technology could rapidly accelerate the deployment of cost-effective plug-in hybrids and electric vehicles, shifting U.S. transportation energy to the grid and dramatically lowering U.S. oil imports.
High Energy Density Lithium Batteries
Envia Systems (Hayward, CA), in collaboration with Argonne National Laboratory, will develop high energy density, low cost next generation Li-ion batteries using novel nano silicon-carbon composite anodes and high capacity manganese rich layered composite cathodes discovered at Argonne National Laboratory. These batteries, if successfully developed, could triple the energy density of existing electric vehicle batteries (target: 400 Wh/kg) and rapidly hasten adoption of low cost plug-in hybrids and electric vehicles.
These tests were performed at the US Army Dugway Proving Grounds under a contract with the Office of Naval Research. Testing is scheduled to continue through to the second quarter of next year and will culminate with the launch of tactically relevant aerodynamic rounds, GA-EMS says in a statement.
GA-EMS adds Blitzer will provide transformational, leap-ahead air defence capability against a number of threats for both naval and land-based applications.
With a muzzle velocity of more than twice that of conventional systems, Blitzer provides significant increases in standoff and lethality at lower cost without the need for propellant or high explosives.
He points out that the nuclear war CO2 is not a big part of his nuclear energy lifecycle CO2 calculation. Most of it is because he assumed 10-19 years to build a nuclear power plant and to assign the CO2 generated from coal power in the meantime to nuclear power.
Jacobson's calculation solar pv delays assumes that solar PV is ready now for a substantial role in reducing CO2. When solar is still needing more research and development and new factories to be built.
Also, nuclear power is already displacing a large amount of fossil fuel. The fossil fuel it would take to generate 2800 TWh of electricity,
A 10% increase in nuclear power via power uprates and operational efficiency could be done faster than an increment in new wind and solar build. 280 TWh within five years.
Dual cooled fuel could achieve 20-50% uprates. and South Korea should start performing those uprates by 2020.
Jacobson ignores any examination of supply chain scaling issues with increased solar, wind and hydro and he ignore siting issues. The impact of the incremental projects on costs is assumed to be flat. Previously when heavy subsidization of solar and wind power caused increased costs for solar and wind and caused delays with shortages of materials and components. He also assumes that if you were to cancel or abandon an Areva nuclear power plant project or a coal power project that this would automatically flow over to an increase in replacement solar, wind and hydro projects.
Regular CO2 Lifecycle Calculations
UVDiv point out this statement from Jacobson.
With respect to the lifecycle emissions, the range included in Table 3 of the above paper includes the nuclear energy industry estimate of 9 g-CO2e/kWh as well as a number just above the AVERAGE of 103 published lifecycle emission studies (70 g-CO2e/kWh).
Is false. The paper cited gets the figure from citation #50, which points to this paper by the kook Sovacool. It “reviews” 103 papers, but it discards most of them, using a subset of 19 studies for the published average. (c.f. table #6). And as a measure of how likely those numbers actually are, simply note that e.g. three of them are by Storm van Leeuwen.
Lack of Internal Consistency
Besides the flaws in the whole Jacobson approach his methods are not even internallu self consistent.
Let me add some points to the time to displace CO2 by energy source and to the imagined deaths from imagined war scenarios.
The whole opportunity costs for CO2 are ramped up and are bogus. Even playing within the ridiculous assumptions the bias can be seen.
But in particular the nuclear numbers are particularly bad because the assumption is that nuclear needs about ten years to add new plants and new power.
Existing nuclear can and are being uprated. There is also the dual cooled nuclear fuel technology invented at MIT (annular fuel) and being developed for deployment in South Korea. This technology will enable existing nuclear plants to have up to 50% more power. Current uprates can achieve 20% increases in power. Uprates take 18-24 months to implement and can be performed during the time planned for a regular fuel change.
There are still operational efficiency gains for existing plants in Ukraine, Japan and other countries.
Construction times are going down with modular construction. South Korea's construction times are down to 48 months and are heading down to 36 months.
The 200MWe chinese pebble bed reactor is starting construction in 2009 and should be completed in 2013. This should be followed by dozens of factory mass produced reactors with construction times heading to 2 years.
The high temperature reactors (like the pebble bed) can be compatible with conversion of existing coal facilities over to nuclear power. Thus reusing the grid and steam generators and the power plant sites.
So building nuclear and accelerating nuclear development can have substantial impact faster. He compares worst case business as usual for nuclear and does not look at what is already being done to accelerate nuclear development. Then assumes a crash program for solar and wind and hydro which does not exist.
For nuclear fuel, Russia is completing its 880 MWe Baloyarsk 4 nuclear breeder reactor. China is buying two of those reactors. India is completing a breeder and will have four others done by 2020.
For the nuclear proliferation
Proliferation is more a matter of key knowledge. The key knowledge was proliferated by Pakistan's AQ Khan back in the seventies through the nineties. Knowledge of bombs and centrifuges. The first 64 years of the nuclear weapon age has seen zero deaths from proliferated nuclear weapons. Plus there is no example of proliferation from a commercial nuclear energy program to nuclear weapons. AQ Khan was the source of proliferation of nuclear weapons knowledge. Any new commercial nuclear reactors are not related to that historical proliferation of knowledge. There would need to be shown incremental risk from new nuclear reactor build for the case to be made that building more commercial nuclear reactors increases the risk of proliferation. The case needs to then be made showing that increased nuclear weapons increases the risk for nuclear war.
The belief that there is nuclear power leads to nuclear weapons is wrong. Countries get nuclear weapons firstly and directly.
USA bombs first. (Hiroshima, Nagasaki - pre nuclear power). 1957 first reactor
USSR bombs first. 1949 first bomb. first nuclear reactor June 27, 1954
United Kingdom first nuclear weapon 1952, first reactor 1956
France tested its first nuclear weapon in 1960, first reactor 1963
China first nuclear weapon in 1964, reactor 1991
India 1974, first reactor 1969 (exception to the bomb first)
Pakistan 1998, karachi 1972 (exception to the bomb first). they used
Pakistan achieved their nuclear weapon material with secret enrichment, centrifuges, not with material from the commercial program.
North Korea 2005 bomb, no commercial reactor
Israel late 1960s, bombs no commercial reactor
Incremental Risk and Lack of Correlation Where is the incremental risk from more commercial reactors ? There were tens of Thousands of nuclaer bombs before there were significant commericial nuclear power.
France added about 50 commercial nuclear reactors in the 1980s. But only USSR/Russia were making a lot more bombs during that period. Mainly USSR/Russia.
By 1990, there were 70,000 nuclear bombs with about 98-99% in USSR and USA.
The nuclear weapons buildup was independent of the civilian nuclear energy build.
Where is the correlation between those 70,000 bombs and actual nuclear war and nuclear deaths ? It was the military posture of hair triggers that had some accident risk, but that policy is no longer in place. A strong case is made that nuclear weapons deterred wide conventional war. Thus there needs to be the calculation for lives saved from prevented wars.
Going forward China, India, Russia, South Korea, Japan are going to be building most of the new commercial nuclear reactors and the USA depending on politics will also build several. How does this correlate to increased proliferation and incrased risk?
Highly enriched uranium (HEU) is being downblended for reactor fuel. Thus commercial nuclear reactors reduced any risks from higher stockpiles of HEU.
Hydro Power Not Given a Worst Case Scenario
For the hydro power - an all out war scenario needs to look at the majority of hydro dams being blown up and the number of deaths calculated from the flooding.
Banqiao Reservoir Dam break killed 90,000-230,000 in 1975.
Mohne Dam bombed on the night of May 16/17 1943. The attack successfully breached the dam and caused widespread loss of life and destruction. almost 1,300 people died in the floods following the dam bombing, many of them Ukrainian women and children, trapped in a German prisoner of war camp below the Mohne dam.
The resulting huge floodwave killed at least 1579 people, 1026 of them foreign forced labourers held in camps downriver. The small city of Neheim-Hüsten was particularly hard-hit with over 800 victims, among them at least 526 victims in a camp for Russian women held for forced labour
* 1366 Direct Wafer: Enabling Terawatt Photovoltaics * Breakthrough High Efficiency Shrouded Wind Turbine * Adaptive Turbine Blades: Blown Wing Technology for Low-Cost Wind Power * Low-contact drilling technology to enable economical EGS wells
1366 Direct Wafer: Enabling Terawatt Photovoltaics
1366 Technologies, Inc. (Lexington, MA), in collaboration with the Massachuseetts Institute of Technology, will develop a breakthrough new "Direct Wafer" technology to form high efficiency "monocrystalline-equivalent" solar silicon wafers directly from the silicon melt at 1/5th the cost of the current industry standard. These next generation solar silicon wafers have the potential to decrease the amount of expensive silicon material needed for silicon solar cells by a factor of > 3 and to decrease installed solar power system costs by a factor of ~2. If successful, this leveraged technology in the silicon solar value chain will slash installed system costs and rapidly accelerate the deployment of carbon-free solar power in the U.S.
"For over 35 years, silicon PV has been hobbled by high costs and difficulties in scaling due to expensive wafering. Our Direct Wafer technology solves the wafering problem with a breakthrough manufacturing solution that is compatible with today's supply chain," said Frank van Mierlo, co-founder and president of 1366 Technologies. "This funding will allow us to accelerate the development and scaling of Direct Wafer, which will have strong implications for the competitiveness of the U.S. PV industry and provide a basis for future economic growth and jobs". 1366 Technologies also recently unveiled the ground breaking Self-Aligned Cell (SAC) architecture, with innovative cell texturing and metallization design to deliver simpler, more commercially-viable solutions for multi-crystalline cell manufacturers striving to achieve 18 percent cell efficiency.
Another 1366 Solar Technology - Self-Aligned Cell
Adaptive Turbine Blades: Blown Wing Technology for Low-Cost Wind Power
PAX Streamline, Inc (San Rafael, CA), along with Georgia Tech Research Institute, will lead a project to adapt Blown Wing technology for wind turbines, culminating in a 100 kW prototype. Circulation control technology or "Blown Wing" technology creates a virtual airfoil by jetting compressed air out of orifices along a wing and has the potential to radically simplify the manufacture and operation of wind turbines. Unlike a fixed airfoil, a Blown Wing can be dynamically adjusted to maximize power under a wide range of wind conditions, and can be generated from a slotted extruded pipe that can be domestically manufactured at a fraction of the cost.
Low-contact drilling technology to enable economical EGS wells
Foro Energy, Inc (Littleton, CO) will develop a disruptive new hybrid thermal-mechanical drilling technology to enable rapid and sustained penetration of ultra-hard rock formations to open up cost effective access to the U.S.'s vast domestic store of U.S. geothermal energy available in deep ultra-hard crytstallinecrystalline basement rock. If successful, this project will revolutionize the geothermal energy field and will allow the U.S. to exploit a huge new source of domestically available baseload carbon-free power.
Breakthrough High Efficiency Shrouded Wind Turbine
FloDesign Wind Turbine Corporation (Wilbraham, MA) will develop a new shrouded, axial-flow wind turbine known as the Mixer Ejector Wind Turbine (MEWT), which is capable of delivering significantly more energy per unit swept area with greatly reduced rotor loading as compared to existing horizontal axis wind turbines (HAWT). Prototypes will be built and tested, demonstrating the advantages of lightweight materials and a protective shroud that will reduce noise and safety concerns and accelerate distributed wind applications.
Lightweight Thermal Energy Recovery (LighTER) System
General Motors R&D received a $2.7 million federal award Monday that will help build a prototype using Shape Memory Alloy, or SMA, that would generate electricity from the heat in automotive exhaust.
“When you heat up a stretched SMA wire, it shrinks back to its pre-stretched length, and when it cools back down it becomes less stiff and can revert to the original shape” said Jan Aase, director of GM’s Vehicle Development Research Laboratory. “A loop of this wire could be used to drive an electric generator to charge a battery.”
It is too soon to identify a vehicle where this technology could work, but hybrid or conventionally powered vehicles are possible applications.
Advanced Semiconductor Materials for High Efficiency Thermoelectric Devices
Phononic Devices, Inc. (Cary, NC) in partnership with the University of Oklahoma, the University of California Santa Cruz, and the California Institute of Technology, will develop a completely new class of high efficiency thermoelectric devices and materials that combine enhanced Seebeck thermopower with thermally insulating semiconductor materials to increase solid state thermal-to-electric conversion efficiencies to unprecedented levels. With greater than 60% of all U.S. energy lost in the form of waste heat from power plants, industrial processes, and vehicles, this high efficiency new thermoelectrics technology holds great promise to enable the U.S. to tap into this vast hidden energy resource to drastically reduce U.S. greenhouse gas emissions.
The University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign (Urbana, IL), in collaboration with MC10, Inc., will develop an economic and highly scalable non-lithographic approach to fabricate large area arrays of 1-D concentric silicon nanotubes for low cost thermoelectric devices. This low cost, earth abundant, flexible new thermoelectric technology holds great promise to allow the U.S. to begin to harvest the more than 60% of its energy that it loses in the form of waste heat, providing an opportunity to drastically reduce U.S. energy waste and greenhouse gas emissions.
Chemical Looping Could Produce Clean Electicity and Hydrogen from Coal and Biomass Pilot Scale Testing of Carbon Negative, Product Flexible Syngas Chemical Looping. A novel process known as Syngas Chemical Looping (SCL), in which coal and biomass are converted to electricity and CO2 is efficiently captured, has been successfully demonstrated on a laboratory scale. In this project, the SCL process, will be scaled up to a 250 kW pilot plant for a planned demonstration at the National Carbon Capture Center. Teaming with Ohio State University are PSRI, CONSOL Energy, Shell/CRI, and Babcock and Wilcox to accelerate this technology towards commercialization and deployment. (DOE grant: $5,000,000)
The syngas chemical looping process (SCL) is a novel method for the conversion of carbonaceous fuels to both electricity and hydrogen while capturing carbon dioxide and other pollutants. The SCL process has the potential to transform the conventional coal conversion processes to a clean, zero emissions process. The separation of CO2 and other contaminants is inherent in SCL, hence no dedicated pollutant control device is required. At the heart of the SCL process is an oxygen carrying metal oxide particle. The scale up of particle production was investigated because the total throughput of the process is directly proportional to the amount of particles being recycled. At present, particles are synthesized through pelletization of composite powders. The production rate of the particles was limited since the fine composite powders (2 – 7 microns) were constantly clogging during the feeding step. Through size increase of the composite powders to 425 – 1000 microns via granulation, clogging was significantly reduced. The scaled up process is currently limited by the size of the mixing drum. The maximum manageable amount of powder (lab scale test) is approximately 2 kg. A larger mixer of a style other than a rotary drum would be preferred.
An independent technical assessment (22 page pdf) of the potential of chemical looping in the context of a Fischer-Tropsch coal-to-liquids (CTL) plant. Several different concepts of chemical looping are being developed. In this analysis the concept under development by Ohio State University (OSU) was assessed to confirm that the thermochemical operations were in heat balance at temperatures compatible with an operable system, and to develop simulations of an entire coal to Fischer-Tropsch (F-T) liquids process, including the proposed looping scheme. Noblis was also asked to compare the technical performance results of a CTL plant with chemical looping with a conventional coal-to-liquids (CTL) system.
The Ohio State University (OSU) is developing a chemical looping scheme that could find application for treating tail gas from a coal based Fischer-Tropsch (F-T) Coal-to-Liquids (CTL) process. This chemical looping concept uses iron oxide (Fe2O3) to react with the unreacted synthesis gas (H2 and CO) and light hydrocarbons in the effluent tail gas from an F-T reactor. This reaction that takes place in a Fuel Reactor produces CO2, H2O and reduced iron. The reduced iron is then reacted with steam to produce hydrogen that can be recycled to the F-T reactor to adjust the input hydrogen to carbon monoxide ratio.
Membrane Process to Capture CO2 from Power Plant Flue Gas CO2 Capture with Enzyme Synthetic Analogue. United Technologies Research Center (UTRC) will develop membrane technology for separating CO2 from flue gas streams using synthetic forms of carbonic anhydrase (CA), which natural systems use to manage CO2. Recent academic research has created synthetic analogue molecules for elucidation of CA enzyme mechanisms which are more robust in harsh environments. UTRC will team with Columbia University, CM-Tech, Hamilton Sundstrand and Worley Parsons in this program. (DOE Share: $2,251,183)
Pulverized coal (PC) plants burn coal in air to produce steam, and comprise 99% of all coal-fired power plants in the United States. CO2 is present in the flue gas exhaust at atmospheric pressure and a concentration of 10-15 volume percent.
The overall goal of this project is to demonstrate a cost-effective membrane-based process to capture CO2 from coal-fired power plant flue gas. The process will reduce power plant CO2 emissions and mitigate the potentially damaging effects of global warming. This project will provide a demonstration of CO2 capture from actual coal-fired flue gas with a membrane system using commercial-scale components. Results from this field test will provide key performance data to allow a thorough technical and economic evaluation of the proposed membrane process. The impact of system scale-up and the development of low-cost components on the capture process economics will be determined. The endpoint and primary technical objective of the program will be to complete a field test of MTR’s [Membrane Technology & Research] CO2 capture membrane process at a coal-fired power plant.
The objective of the proposed two-year research and development program is to develop, test, and validate a membrane process capable of effectively and efficiently capturing >90% of the CO2 from coal-fired power plant flue gas in the temperature range of 50-60 °C. The testing will include a slipstream field test of MTR’s membrane process using commercial modules to treat coal combustion flue gas.
More Energy Efficient CO2 Capture Energy Efficient Capture of CO2 from Coal Flue Gas. Nalco and Argonne National Laboratory have partnered to develop an electrochemical process for CO2 capture. A technique known as Resin-Wafer Electrodeionization (RW-EDI) leverages control of pH to adsorb and desorb CO2 from flue gas without the need for heating or a vacuum. The objective is to drastically reduce the current parasitic power loss of 30% that is currently associated with carbon capture from flue gas. (DOE grant: $2,250,487)
Carbon Nanotube Membranes Carbon nanotube membranes for energy-efficient carbon sequestration. Porifera Inc will lead a team including the University of California and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory that will integrate carbon nanotubes with polymer membranes to increase the flux of CO2 capture membranes by up to 100x. Physical and chemical modifications to the carbon nanotubes will be used to increase the selectivity of the membrane for CO2. The program objective is to demonstrate a more efficient and economical means of carbon capture over current state of the art amine technology. (DOE grant: $1,077,992)
Livermore’s carbon nanotubes will be integrated into polymer membranes to increase the flux of carbon dioxide capture membranes by two orders of magnitude. The technology could enable much less expensive carbon capture from coal plants.
Electric field swing adsorption for carbon capture applications. Electric Field Swing Adsorption (EFSA) is a technique that takes advantage of the ability of electric fields to change the interaction of molecules on a surface. In this project, Lehigh University will apply EFSA to high surface area conductive solid carbon sorbents for the adsorption and desorption of CO2 across a wide range of process conditions. The EFSA technique has the potential for drastically reduced parasitic load compared with current carbon capture methodologies. (DOE grant: $566,641)
The newly-developed epoxy carbon fiber matrix can tolerate increased damage to the leading edge of the fan thereby dramatically improving resistance to damage caused by bird ingestion. “This advancement was inadvertently validated when a screwdriver was accidentally ingested into a fan during the maximum power tests of an M400,” stated Dr. Paul Moller, President of Moller International. “The screwdriver caused a significant notch in the leading edge of the fan but was quickly repaired with epoxy filler. An aluminum fan blade would have to be replaced if it had survived the impact, which is problematic.”
Carbon fiber has up to seven times the tensile strength of aluminum. As a result, the blades can be designed to have a very large safety factor.
The company aims to build a Metal-Air Ionic Liquid battery that has up to 11 times the energy density of the top lithium-ion technologies for less than one-third the cost. Cody Friesen, a professor of materials science at Arizona State and founder of Fluidic Energy, says the use of ionic liquids overcomes many of the problems that have held back metal-air batteries in the past.
The research team will target energy densities of at least 900 watt-hours per kilogram and up to 1,600 watt-hours per kilogram in the DOE-funded ($5 million) project.
The problem with ionic liquids is that they're still made in small quantities, making them expensive compared to many other solvents used to dissolve salts. "But some people are making ionic liquids now out of things that are already known and produced in high quantities, like detergents," says Wilkes.
Electrical engineers at the University of Washington have developed an implantable neural sensing chip that needs less power. Other wireless medical devices, such as cochlea or retinal implants, rely on inductive coupling, which means the power source needs to be centimeters away. The new sensor platform, called NeuralWISP, draws power from a radio source up to a meter away.
An electric solar wind sail is a recently introduced propellantless space propulsion method whose technical development has also started. The electric sail consists of a set of long, thin, centrifugally stretched and conducting tethers which are charged positively and kept in a high positive potential of order 20 kV by an onboard electron gun. The positively charged tethers deflect solar wind protons, thus tapping momentum from the solar wind stream and producing thrust. The amount of obtained propulsive thrust depends on how many electrons are trapped by the potential structures of the tethers, because the trapped electrons tend to shield the charged tether and reduce its effect on the solar wind.
A new research paper shows that if trapped electrons can be removed that thrust can increase five times from 500 nN/m [at 1AU for average solar wind conditions and for reasonable values of the driving voltage] to 2500 nN/meter, which means 1 Newton of thrust for 2000 kilometers of total tethers. From the picture above you could have 50 tethers (wires) that were each 40 kilometers long.
The ESTCube-1 is a 1 kg nanosatellite and Estonia's first satellite, with planned launch in 2012. It will open a 10 meter tether made of very thin metal wire and charge it to 200 V with a miniature onboard electron gun. As the satellite flies in its orbital path through the ionospheric plasma, the speed difference between the satellite and the plasma induces a small force on the tether which can be measured. The measurement is used to validate and calibrate existing plasma physical theory of the electric sail effect.
Later, production-scale electric sails will use much longer tethers and will fly in the solar wind, utilising the much larger speed difference between the satellite and the fast-moving solar wind. According to estimates, electric sails can be orders of magnitude more efficient than existing methods (chemical rockets and ion engines) for many transport tasks in the solar system. Scientifically, they could revolutionize solar system science by enabling fast missions out of the heliosphere and affordable sample return missions from planetary, moon and asteroid targets. Commercially, electric sail could enable the economic utilization of asteroid resources for e.g. orbital rocket propellant production or orbital manufacturing of structural parts.
Picture caption: A more advanced siamese twin deployment of two sets of slar electric sail tethers
Here we present physical arguments and test particle calculations indicating that in a realistic three-dimensional electric sail spacecraft there exist a natural mechanism which tends to remove the trapped electrons by chaotising their orbits and causing them to eventually collide with the conducting tethers. We present calculations which indicate that if these mechanisms were able to remove trapped electrons nearly completely, the electric sail performance could be about five times higher than previously estimated, about 500 nN/m, corresponding to 1N thrust for a baseline construction with 2000 km total tether length.
2000 km total length of tether (for example, 50 tethers 40 km long each) could weigh 50–100 kg (frame, solar panels, high-voltage power source, electron gun, motorised tether reels, various sensors and control processor), of which the tether mass is 10 kg. According to the new results, such a device could produce 1N thrust and produce a specific acceleration of 10–20 mm/s2. If used to move a 500 kg payload, for example, the device would produce a 30 km/s velocity change over six months.
The theoretical results presented here call for experimental verification. The verification could come from a measurement of electrosphere size, thrust force or both in a space or laboratory experiment. Two-dimensional particlein-cell or Vlasov plasma simulations might give a better estimate of the thrust force than the rough analytical calculations presented in this paper. The 2-D simulations would need to be equipped with some kind of trapped electron removal scheme. Because the electron temperature 12 eV is several thousand times smaller than the depth of the potential well, extra care should be taken into the simulations to avoid spurious trapping by numerical errors.
Although the electric sail plasma physical problem is simple in the sense that only electrostatic forces are involved, the problem spans a wide range in parameter space. The range in energy goes from 12 eV electron temperature to 20 kV tether potential. The spatial scale is from 10μm radius wires to 100 m wide potential structure and to 20–100 km long tethers, which gives 7 to 10 orders of magnitude in space. Finally, the timescales start from 0.1 ps needed for an electron to move across a 10μm wire width to several minutes needed to remove the trapped electrons (15–16 orders of magnitude). It is evident from this range of scales that a brute-force simulation approach is not fruitful. Thus, while theory is essential and simulations helpful, experimental studies are crucial in designing the electric sail.
Finally, it is worth remarking that if the electric sail thrust is indeed as large as the estimates presented in this paper indicate, the potential of the electric sail for space transportation in the solar system is enormous. Exploring the potential scientific and commerical applications and implications is, however, outside the scope of this theoretical study.
A full-scale electric sail consists of a number (50-100) of long (e.g., 20 km), thin (e.g., 25 microns) conducting tethers (wires). The spacecraft contains a solar-powered electron gun (typical power a few hundred watts) which is used to keep the spacecraft and the wires in a high (typically 20 kV) positive potential. The electric field of the wires extends a few tens of metres into the surrounding solar wind plasma. Therefore the solar wind ions "see" the wires as rather thick, about 100 m wide obstacles. A technical concept exists for deploying (opening) the wires in a relatively simple way and guiding or "flying" the resulting spacecraft electrically.
The main limitation of the electric sail is that since it uses the solar wind, it cannot produce much thrust inside a magnetosphere where there is no solar wind. Although the direction of the thrust is basically away from the Sun, the direction can be varied within some limits by inclining the sail. Tacking towards the Sun is therefore also possible.
Researchers observed previously unconsidered strong kinematic forces on neutral atoms in short-pulse laser fields. The ponderomotive force on electrons is the driving mechanism, producing ultra-strong acceleration of neutral atoms greater that Earth's gravitational acceleration by 14 orders of magnitude. A force of such strength may lead to new applications in both fundamental and applied physics. On the cover, a record of the deflection of neutral helium atoms after interaction with a focused laser beam.
A charged particle exposed to an oscillating electric field experiences a force proportional to the cycle-averaged intensity gradient. This so-called ponderomotive force plays a major part in a variety of physical situations such as Paul traps for charged particles, electron diffraction in strong (standing) laser fields(the Kapitza–Dirac effect) and laser-based particle acceleration. Comparably weak forces on neutral atoms in inhomogeneous light fields may arise from the dynamical polarization of an atom; these are physically similar to the cycle-averaged forces. Here we observe previously unconsidered extremely strong kinematic forces on neutral atoms in short-pulse laser fields. We identify the ponderomotive force on electrons as the driving mechanism, leading to ultrastrong acceleration of neutral atoms with a magnitude as high as 10^14 times the Earth's gravitational acceleration, g. To our knowledge, this is by far the highest observed acceleration on neutral atoms in external fields and may lead to new applications in both fundamental and applied physics.
The Würzburg nanocapsules are comprised of a unique material. This was developed in Frank Würthner's working group on the basis of so-called amphiphilic perylene bisimides. If the base material, which can be isolated as a powder, is placed in water, its molecules automatically form so-called vesicles, though these are not stable at that point. It is only through photopolymerization with light that they become robust nanocapsules that are stable in an aqueous solution - regardless of its pH value.
The diameter of one nanocapsule is a mere 20 to 50 nanometers. Dr Xin Zhang, a visiting scientist from China, managed to fill the nanocapsules with other photoactive molecules.
Zhang smuggled bispyrene molecules into the nanocapsules. The special thing about these molecules is that they change their shape to suit their environment. Where the pH value is low, in other words in an acidic environment, they assume an elongated form. If they are then excited with UV light, they emit blue fluorescent light.
If the pH value rises, the molecules fold. In this shape they emit green fluorescent light. In this state the bispyrenes excite the capsule shell energetically, which reacts to this with red fluorescence.
Blue, green, and red. If the three primary colors overlap, this produces white - as with a color television. It is the same with the nanocapsules: with a pH value of 9, in other words just right of neutral, they emit white fluorescent light - "a so far unique effect in the field of chemical sensing, which might be groundbreaking for the design of fluorescence probes for life sciences," explains Professor Würthner.
The Würzburg chemists have access to an extremely sensitive nanoprobe: the pH value of an aqueous solution can be determined with nanoscale spatial resolution over the wavelength of the fluorescent light emitted by the nanocapsules.
This means that nanocapsules are not just an option for artificial photosynthesis, they can also be used for diagnostic applications. For example, they could be equipped with special surface structures that purposefully dock to tumor cells and then make these visible by means of fluorescence.
The value of artificial photosynthesis
Why conduct research into artificial photosynthesis? In photosynthesis, plants consume the "climate killer" that is carbon dioxide. In view of global warming, many scientists see artificial photosynthesis as a possible way of reducing the volume of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. In addition, this process would also create valuable raw materials: sugar, starch, and the gas methane.
The viruses often used to carry genes into the body can endanger patients. Furthermore, the particles created in Langer’s lab now rival viruses’ efficiency at delivering their DNA payload.
This summer the nanoparticle-delivered gene therapy successfully suppressed ovarian tumor growth in mice.
One drawback to non-viral vectors is that they are not as efficient as viruses at integrating their DNA payload into the target cell’s genome, says Leaf Huang, professor in the School of Pharmacy at the University of North Carolina. However, in the past several years, advances by Langer and others have improved that efficiency by several orders of magnitude.
“Non-viral vectors are now comparable to viral vectors, in some cases,” says Huang, whose research focuses on delivering genes surrounded by a fatty membrane. “They have come a long way compared to 10 years ago.”
Both viral and non-viral methods could eventually prove useful and safe, says gene therapy researcher Katherine High, who is part of a team that recently used viral gene therapy to restore some sight to children suffering from a congenital retinal disease.
The ovarian cancer treatment developed at MIT and the Lankenau Institute has been successful in animal studies but is not yet ready for clinical trials. Such trials could get under way in a year or two, says Anderson. Meanwhile, he and others in Langer’s lab are exploring other uses for their nanoparticles. Last month, the researchers reported using the particles to boost stem cells’ ability to regenerate vascular tissue (such as blood vessels) by equipping them with genes that produce extra growth factors.
“We’ve had success with gene delivery using these nanoparticles, so we thought they might be a safer, temporary way to modify stem cells,” says Anderson.
Day 3 also appears to be done with no change in the standings or prizes won. Lasermotive has won the level 1 prize of $900,000. No other prizes were won and no other team qualified for a prize.
Kansas City still failed short of reaching the top, though it seems that their problems are largely solved and so we can expect a credible challenge to LaserMotive from KCSP tomorrow.
USST were facing a series of problems, and were not able to run at all. What they can do Friday morning is anyone’s guess. Based on previous years, however, we should definitely not be counting them as having lost. All of their first-place climbs to date were made at the last minute of the last possible day.
USST (University of Saskatchewan) failed to climb more than a few meters and are now done. Lasermotive is done. Only Kansas City Pirates can improve and try to get a prize qualifying run.
Lasermotive climbing on day 3
10:39 PST: Hey #SEGames Ted Semon & Bryan Laubscher (Space Elevator Games live › http://ustre.am/4mZA) 11:23 PST: Hey #SEGames No. (Space Elevator Games live › http://ustre.am/4mZA)
USST & LaserMotive done. Hoping to get started with KCSP about 10 minutes from now [at about 1 PM PST].
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