Posted by Ben Proudlove on Mon, Mar 22, 2010 @ 12:11 PM
Professor Critoph's group at Warwick University have just taken delivery of their new state of the art Rubotherm system for measuring binary vapour sorption.
Situated in their recently refurbished laboratory with their existing Rubotherm system this Magnetic Suspension Balance gravimetric system and dosing system is specifically designed to allow two vapours to be created and mixed (to known amounts) before dosing over a sample to measure selective sorption. The system can also be used for single vapour or gas dosing and also mixtures of gases where temperature control is important when they are pressurised (e.g. CO2 for carbon capture work)
Posted by Ben Proudlove on Mon, Mar 08, 2010 @ 10:10 AM
Available in the UK and Ireland from Merrow Scientific (elsewhere in the world from Rubotherm) the Isosorp HyGrA range is an economically priced range allowing researchers with limited budgets the opportunity to utilise the Rubotherm patented technology to carry out gravimetric studies while subjecting samples to a wide range of conditions.
No longer are researchers limited to doing research to 20bar - simply because that's all the instrument can go to; the Isosorp HyGrA system allows sample mass change to be measured from Ultra High Vacuum to 200bar and from 77K to 770K (a wide range of other conditions including much higher pressures can be analysed using other systems from the Rubotherm range)
Systems are available for sorption research using gases, vapours and supercritical fluids so opening a wide range of applications such as hydrogen, CO2, methane storage; vapour adsorption and supercritical extraction. Further information can be seen on the economical gravimetric sorption analysis page
Posted by Ben Proudlove on Tue, Dec 01, 2009 @ 12:17 PM
Further to their interview with Professor Kitagawa's group Science Watch have followed this up with an interesting Q&A session with Professor Kimoon Kim discussing the work at POSTECH in Korea looking at rigid and flexible MOFs for such applications as hydrogen or CO2 storage.
Metal Organic Frameworks (also known as Porous Coordination Polymers) can be designed and synthesised to meet many application demands and current research is pushing the boundaries in terms of being able to meet the hydrogen storage capacity requirements set by the US guidelines as well as being useful for the capture of CO2...
Posted by Ben Proudlove on Wed, Nov 25, 2009 @ 05:34 AM
This post on worldchanging.com details the new development at Sandia National Laboratories in New Mexico where they are using sunlight to convert carbon dioxide and water to syngas.
Using an iron oxide that loses an oxygen molecule at high temperature (1500degC) and retrieves one when cooled down the system can be used to convert CO2 to CO and also H2O to H2. So you can either use it for making Syngas or Hydrogen generation for use in fuel cells.
This is quite an interesting development as it means a relatively low energy demand (the system uses heat from the Sun to generate the 1500degC needed) unlike some other alternative fuel sources. The syngas can then be converted to synthetic fuel via Fischer Tropsch reactions or the hydrogen could be used for electricity generation through fuel cells.
Synthetic fuels can be used though the existing infrastructure so relatively easily employed as an alternative to current car fuels. The hydrogen usage in fuel cells can also be either utilised in mobile fuel cells (e.g. those located in a car) or perhaps easier can be utilised through larger static fuel cells to feed back electricity into the grid (and then distributed where needed).
So does that mean in the future all you'll need is a Sandia type system, a fuel cell, some water and a bit of sunshine. So looks like the UK will be oil dependent for a while longer then......
Posted by Ben Proudlove on Fri, Nov 20, 2009 @ 06:59 AM
Really interesting interview with Professor Omar Yaghi on the Yaghi Laboratory Website.
Professor Yaghi is one of the leaders in the field of Metal Organic Frameworks (MOFs) and here he discusses their use for CO2 capture. The specific MOF he mentions 1g of the material has a surface area the size of 60-70 tennis courts! And this porous framework can be "designed" to selectively allow sorption of CO2 rather than other gases.
You may also be interested in having a look at our MOF research instrumentation page.
Posted by Ben Proudlove on Wed, Sep 02, 2009 @ 03:11 PM
Interesting article about further research in the USA into CO2 storage here. Merrow Scientific are actively involved in this area through our Rubotherm magnetic suspension balance. We can actively measure CO2 storage into materials at a wide range of conditions looking at mass change of the sample.