Paint that smell!
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News and Views i New image detector Hitachi Ltd and the Japanese Broadcasting Corp, NHK, have announced the development of a new orthicon which they say is 20 times as sensitive to the best previously available and a thousand times more sensitive than a normal camera tube. Hitachi hopes to bring the device, based on a photoconductive membrane of amorphous selenium, to fully commercial status within five years. Estimated selling price is around Yen 10 million, competitive with devices now available. The companies claim that the new device is capable of discerning letters on a magazine illuminated with only 0.1 lux, the equivalent of reading by starlight. This extreme sensitivity to light and other similar radiation, such as ultraviolet and X-rays, makes it potentially useful for medical imaging and special industrial applications, as well as deep sea photography and astronomy, the companies say. The membrane in the orthicon is fabricated from amorphous selenium, to a thickness of 25 microns and, in addition, stainless steel electrodes are used to prevent picture distortion caused by sending high voltages through the membrane. The increased sensitivity is said to be due to the avalanche effect which occurs when high voltage of around 2500 volts is applied to the photoconductive membrane. The device was developed in Japan at Hitachi's Central Research laboratory, in cooperation with NHK's Science & Technical Research Laboratories. Separators for Aramco In an effort to increase daily crude oil production from 8 million to 10 million barrels, Aramco, Saudi Arabia's national oil company is planning to construct ten new gas-oil separators. Invitations to bid are expected by August. The new separators will be used to develop seven newly discovered oil fields in the interior of the country. Paint that smell! Tests at Linkoping University, Sweden, have demonstrated the efficacy of a smell-absorbing paint, claimed to remove 80% of odoriferous organic chemicals. The product, known as KefaTherm and produced by Swedish manufacturer Kefa Hightech, uses a vast number of fine pores to first absorb the smells and then oxidise them. The effective ingredient is not disclosed. In the tests, a mixture of 27 organic chemicals - ranging from simple compounds like octanol to methoxynaphthalene and diphenyl ether - were exposed to a strip of the paint in a closed glass bottle. After 24 hours, the paint had removed more than 95% of octanol and diphenyl ether, but only half of the methoxynaphthalene. On average, the removal was 80%. Potential uses for the paint are numerous, including art galleries and public conveniences. It is said to be effective in removing the persistent smell of smoke - both from tobacco and other sources. Structure of light antenna According to a recent issue of Nature (vol 350, page 130, 1991), the first three-dimensional structure of the light harvesting complex LHC-2 has been determined at a resolution of 6 A, by electron crystallography. The complex, which functions as the major antenna of solar energy in plant photosynthesis, is a membrane protein that passes energy on to the photosynthetic reaction centre. The generation of transmembrane potential provides the energy for evolution of oxygen, synthesis of adenosine triphosphate, and carbon fixation. The crystallography work was done at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory, Heidelberg, Germany, by Werner Kuhlbrandt and Da Neng Wang. X-ray crystallography could not be used because the best crystals the researchers have so far obtained are too small. The electron crystallography techniques, developed by Richard Henderson and Nigel Unwin at the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology, Cambridge, UK, were used last year to determine the structure of bacteriorhodopsin. Knowledge of the LHC-2 structure should help studies into the mechanism of photosynthesis, and provide an explanation of the way energy is transmitted within the photosynthetic membrane, the report says. Air Products moves further into controlled atmosphere Following on from its recent announcement (see Membrane Technology No 12) of a tie up with the shipping company Maersk to supply membrane based controlled atmosphere systems for refrigerated 2 Membrane Technology
Transcript of Paint that smell!
News and Views i
New image detector Hitachi Ltd and the Japanese Broadcasting Corp, NHK, have announced the development of a new orthicon which they say is 20 times as sensitive to the best previously available and a thousand times more sensitive than a normal camera tube. Hitachi hopes to bring the device, based on a photoconductive membrane of amorphous selenium, to fully commercial status within five years. Estimated selling price is around Yen 10 million, competitive with devices now available.
The companies claim that the new device is capable of discerning letters on a magazine illuminated with only 0.1 lux, the equivalent of reading by starlight. This extreme sensitivity to light and other similar radiation, such as ultraviolet and X-rays, makes it potentially useful for medical imaging and special industrial applications, as well as deep sea photography and astronomy, the companies say.
The membrane in the orthicon is fabricated from amorphous selenium, to a thickness of 25 microns and, in addition, stainless steel electrodes are used to prevent picture distortion caused by sending high voltages through the membrane. The increased sensitivity is said to be due to the avalanche effect which occurs when high voltage of around 2500 volts is applied to the photoconductive membrane.
The device was developed in Japan at Hitachi's Central Research laboratory, in cooperation with NHK's Science & Technical Research Laboratories.
Separators for Aramco In an effort to increase daily crude oil production from 8 million to 10 million barrels, Aramco, Saudi Arabia's national oil company is planning to construct ten new gas-oil separators. Invitations to bid are expected by August.
The new separators will be used to develop seven newly discovered oil fields in the interior of the country.
Paint that smell! Tests at Linkoping University, Sweden, have demonstrated the efficacy of a smell-absorbing paint, claimed to remove 80% of odoriferous organic chemicals. The product, known as KefaTherm and produced by Swedish manufacturer Kefa Hightech, uses a vast number of fine pores to first absorb the
smells and then oxidise them. The effective ingredient is not disclosed.
In the tests, a mixture of 27 organic chemicals - ranging from simple compounds like octanol to methoxynaphthalene and diphenyl ether - were exposed to a strip of the paint in a closed glass bottle. After 24 hours, the paint had removed more than 95% of octanol and diphenyl ether, but only half of the methoxynaphthalene. On average, the removal was 80%. Potential uses for the paint are numerous, including art galleries and public conveniences. It is said to be effective in removing the persistent smell of smoke - both from tobacco and other sources.
Structure of light antenna According to a recent issue of Nature (vol 350, page 130, 1991), the first three-dimensional structure of the light harvesting complex LHC-2 has been determined at a resolution of 6 A, by electron crystallography. The complex, which functions as the major antenna of solar energy in plant photosynthesis, is a membrane protein that passes energy on to the photosynthetic reaction centre. The generation of transmembrane potential provides the energy for evolution of oxygen, synthesis of adenosine triphosphate, and carbon fixation.
The crystallography work was done at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory, Heidelberg, Germany, by Werner Kuhlbrandt and Da Neng Wang. X-ray crystallography could not be used because the best crystals the researchers have so far obtained are too small. The electron crystallography techniques, developed by Richard Henderson and Nigel Unwin at the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology, Cambridge, UK, were used last year to determine the structure of bacteriorhodopsin.
Knowledge of the LHC-2 structure should help studies into the mechanism of photosynthesis, and provide an explanation of the way energy is transmitted within the photosynthetic membrane, the report says.
Air Products moves further into controlled atmosphere Following on from its recent announcement (see Membrane Technology No 12) of a tie up with the shipping company Maersk to supply membrane based controlled atmosphere systems for refrigerated
2 Membrane Technology
