Category Archives: Fuel Cells

MTI names new president


August 2, 2004

Aug. 2, 2004 — Mechanical Technology Inc. announced the appointment of Steven Fischer as its chairman and chief executive officer. Fischer has been a member of the company’s board of directors since 2003 and was formerly chairman of professional services firm UHY Advisors NY Inc.

Dale Church, MTI’s chairman and CEO since 2002, will become president of MTI Government Systems, where he will focus on business development for MTI subsidiaries, including MTI MicroFuel Cells Inc. The company said it plans to ship its first micro fuel cell product toward the end of 2004.

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July 23, 2004 – Our energy needs often conflict with our environment and health. The production, use and distribution of energy sources such as fossil fuels have been linked to an array of problems, from global warming and greenhouse gases, to damaging oil spills and debilitating pollutants.

Coal mining and oil drilling carry their own baggage, from ecological destruction to erosion to leaching.

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Nanotechnology offers an opportunity to get the desirable benefits of energy — reliable and affordable power — with less or none of the drawbacks.

The elementary steps of energy conversion occur on the nanoscale in processes such as charge transfer. Working at that scale allows us to develop innovative approaches for energy devices, storage and generation.

Opportunities include:

•novel, lightweight materials to improve vehicle efficiency;

•selective catalysts for clean and energy-efficient processes;

•increased efficiency and reduced cost of solar energy;

•methodologies enabling water to be split via sunlight to generate hydrogen; and

•efficient and low-cost fuel cells, batteries, etc.

Nanotechnology-enabled products have the potential not only to greatly reduce existing environmental harm associated with fossil fuels, but also to prevent future environmental degradation with affordable, efficient and effective clean-energy alternatives.

Examples of such nanotechnology-enabled products include environmental monitoring devices that allow for quick and accurate detection of compounds at extremely low concentrations in both accessible and hostile environments. The availability of real-time data can help expedite cleanup efforts, minimizing damage when an accident occurs.

Nanotechnology is also a driving force in the development of novel filter materials that remove contaminants from air and water. These approaches promise to achieve safety levels far better than current standards require. Due to size and cost reductions, these technologies can be ubiquitously placed in environmental settings.

Additional technologies are being refined that use nanoparticles to treat contaminated groundwater and subsurface areas, resulting in minimal or no environmental damage.

But the true excitement and promise of nanotechnology lies in the development of cost-effective and efficient “green” or environmentally benign energy sources. The use of solar and wind power as viable and sustainable energy sources may be achieved more rapidly and effectively using nanotechnology.

At present, solar energy devices have low-energy efficiencies and often exist as large, unwieldy attachments to structures. Nanotechnology researchers are advancing the state of photovoltaics to enable increased energy production, while achieving reductions in component size and cost.

In addition, the development of novel solar energy storage units will enable continuous operation of electrical, heating/cooling equipment using the sun’s power. Further successes will propel solar energy forward as a more desirable option among the various energy sources available.

The effect of nanotechnology on the evolution of wind as an energy source could lead to improved designs incorporating novel energy-storage capabilities, improved energy-transmission devices and more compact structures. Using nanotechnology, it may be possible to make wind turbines that are smaller with higher energy yields and to use this harnessed energy to generate electricity and heat with minimal energy losses.

Such advances would result in more aesthetically attractive, affordable, and energy-efficient structures that could be used as alternative power sources for society.

Current research into fuel cell technology is another area where nanotechnology use and development is making progress. Advances include increases in miniaturization and energy efficiency, reductions in cost, increased flexibility in fuel type used, improved integration with other systems and improvements in reliability and durability.

Such advances will result from the use of alternative nanomaterials and innovative nanotechnology-derived devices.

The merging or fusion of these alternative energy sources could also occur as a result of nanotechnology. Incorporation of solar, wind and fuel cell components into power-generating equipment could provide substantial savings in space, cost and time.

Such devices would provide environmentally clean alternative energy sources that are smaller, more powerful and more economically feasible.

The technological advances that nanotechnology offers through environmentally benign energy sources could help achieve the goals of a sustainable planet and a healthy environment for all.

These goals will be realized through elimination of waste generated from burning fossil fuels, through decreased reliance on non-renewable energy resources that mar the environment upon removal, and through attendant reductions in environmental damage from fossil fuel accidents such as spills and leaks.

Clean, affordable energy sources will enable the Environmental Protection Agency to continue to protect human health and safeguard the natural environment.

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July 9, 2004 -Energy is the single most important challenge facing humanity today.

As we peak in oil production and worry about natural gas supplies, life must go on. Somehow, we must find a basis for energy prosperity in the 21st century for ourselves and the rest of humanity.

By the middle of this century we should assume that we will need to double world energy production from its current level, with most of this coming from clean, sustainable, carbon dioxide-free sources. For worldwide peace and prosperity, it must be cheap. We simply cannot do this with current technology.

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We will need revolutionary breakthroughs to find the clean, low-cost energy necessary for advanced civilization of the 10 billion souls we expect to be living on this planet before this century is out.

The system most likely to meet that goal is an electrical-based grid that draws from numerous sources — solar, wind, nuclear, geothermal, biomass and fossil fuels — for reliable energy. Nanotechnology will be a contributor, as well as other technologies, if we provide sufficient support.

Consider, for example, a vast interconnected electrical energy grid for the North American continent. By 2050 this grid will interconnect several hundred million local sites. There are two key aspects of this future grid that will make a huge difference: massive long-distance electrical power transmission, and local storage of electrical power with real-time pricing.

Storage of electrical power is critical for stability and robustness of the electrical power grid, and it is essential if we are to use solar and wind as our dominant primary power source.

The best place to provide this storage is locally, near the point of use. Imagine by 2050 that every house, business and building has its own local electrical energy storage device, an uninterruptible power supply capable of handling the needs of the owner for 24 hours.

Today using lead-acid storage batteries, such a unit for a house to store 100-kilowatt hours of electrical energy would take up a small room and cost more than $10,000.

Through advances in nanotechnology, it may be possible to shrink an equivalent unit to the size of a washer and drop the cost to $1,000. Among the approaches being developed today are nanotubes, nanowires and nanocomposites for batteries.

On another front, nanostructured membranes, nanohorn electrodes and nanocatalysts are helping to make fuel cells smaller, lighter and more affordable.

With research and entrepreneurial efforts, many schemes are likely to emerge to supply this local energy storage market that may expand to several billion units worldwide.

The grid can become robust with these advances, since local storage protects customers from power fluctuations and outages. With real-time pricing, the local customers have incentive to take power from the grid when it is cheapest.

This permits the primary electrical energy providers to deliver power to the grid when it is most efficient for them to do so, and reduce the requirements for reserve capacity to follow peaks in demand. Most importantly, it permits a large portion of the primary electrical power on the grid to come from solar and wind.

The other critical innovation needed is massive electrical power transmission over continental distances, permitting, for example, hundreds of gigawatts of electrical power to be transported from solar farms in New Mexico to markets in New England.

Nanotechnology in the form of single-wall carbon nanotubes (or buckytubes) forming a quantum wire may play a role in this electrical transmission system.

As wires, buckytubes are superb conductors, offering a current density far higher than today’s options. They’re also lightweight, stronger than steel and shrink rather than expand when heated.

Expanding wires cause power lines to sag, making them less efficient electricity carriers and fire hazards if they dip into tree limbs.

These technologies will allow primary power producers to compete with little concern for the actual distance to market. Clean coal plants in Wyoming, stranded gas in Alaska, wind farms in North Dakota, hydroelectric power from British Columbia, nuclear power from Washington, and solar power from the vast western deserts, etc., contribute power to consumers far away on the grid.

Everybody plays.

Such innovations in power transmission, storage and generation technologies themselves can only come from discoveries in science together with free enterprise in open competition for worldwide markets.

America should take the lead. We should launch a bold New Energy Research Program. Just a nickel from every gallon of gasoline, diesel, fuel oil, and jet fuel would generate $10 billion a year. That would be enough to transform the physical sciences and engineering in this country.

At minimum it will generate a cornucopia of new technologies that will drive wealth and job creation. At best, we will solve the energy problem within this next generation; solve it for ourselves and, by example, solve it for the rest of humanity as well.

Give a nickel. Save the world.

This column was adapted from Senate testimony given on April 27.

June 21, 2004 – MTI MicroFuel Cells Inc. has launched fuel cell technology designed to provide cord-free rechargeable power for industrial, military and consumer electronics.

MTI Micro’s Mobion direct methanol fuel cell technology has been integrated into radio-frequency identification tag readers that are planned by year’s end for retail, distribution and warehouses. The technology has been demonstrated and integrated in two concept models, a handheld entertainment system and a combined PDA-mobile phone.

The Albany, N.Y.-based firm said Mobion eliminates the water management “micro-plumbing” around the fuel cell that typically required for the chemical reaction. MTI Micro’s patented system manages the water inside the fuel cell with no pumping required.

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NEW YORK, May 27, 2004 – “Buy a micro fuel cell and get a free laptop computer,” runs the insider’s joke.

Efforts to miniaturize fuel cells for notebook computers have been beset by cost and performance problems that have delayed debuts and inspired the industry’s black humorists. But two small companies in New York intend to have the last laugh in what is shaping up to be a market showdown. Early success could translate into sales of up to 120-million units by 2012, according to a study released this month.

Medis Technologies, with offices in New York City and Israel, expects to deliver devices toward the year’s end that are smaller than a pager with enough power for 12 to 15 hours of mobile phone talk time or half a dozen recharges of a digital camera. Competitor MTI Micro Fuel Cells Inc. of Albany also plans to ship first-generation products for radios and RFID tag readers in 2004.

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Chief Executive Robert Lifton said that he expects Medis to send about 1,000 disposable units costing around $15 to distribution partner Kensington Technology Group, a division of ACCO Brands Inc. that makes computer accessories and cases. Products should be available to consumers in the first quarter of 2005. The company also works with General Dynamics on micro fuel cells to run military handheld computers.

MTI will supply fuel cells to Harris Corp. for military radios and to Intermec Technologies Inc. for industrial handheld RFID tag readers. Those customers can control the refueling of power cells in a warehouse or military setting. But Chief Executive William Acker said the company is aiming for the broader consumer market through its investor Gillette Inc. and its Duracell subsidiary.

MTI is developing a prototype small enough to work in portable consumer electronic devices. It is also partnering with Flextronics, an electronics manufacturing services firm, to facilitate its product launch and marketing.

The two startups rely on different technologies. MTI’s system runs on 100-percent methanol fuel, while the Medis Power Pack operates on a proprietary glycerol liquid. MTI’s device is built around proton exchange membrane (PEM) architecture using a polymer membrane material developed by DuPont. DuPont owns a 3.7-percent stake in the company. DuPont Fuel Cell is part of a supply-chain team MTI unveiled in mid-May.

David Redstone, editor of the Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Investor, gives Medis the edge. “The combination of their fuel, proprietary electrolyte and catalyst materials adds up to unmatched power density,” he said. He said Medis allowed its devices to be tested and measured independently, and reported what they will cost.

Large corporations such as NEC, Samsung, Motorola and Hitachi have announced, and delayed in Toshiba’s case, micro fuel cell plans and prototypes.

An analysis released May 19 by the Asian Technology Information Program said Japanese manufacturers would begin incorporating small fuel cells into notebook computers in 2005. ABI Research reported in mid-May that micro fuel cells would appear in a small number of laptops in 2005, and more than 13 percent of laptops would be powered by fuel cells by 2012.

Atakan Ozbek, director of energy research at ABI, said one of the Asian companies could make a breakthrough with a nanomaterial or engineering trick that could improve the commercial prospects of micro fuel cells. But “there are still more questions than answers” on how the field will unfold, he said.

Redstone remains skeptical until fuel cell companies provide products and set costs. “Micro fuel cells are not going to replace laptop batteries anytime soon,” he said.

Several analysts noted that electronics giants have been tight-lipped about the progress and timing of micro fuel cell products. But big companies can afford to remain silent while they nurture R&D programs and get performance data from internal field tests before making any product announcements.

Jerry Hallmark, manager of Motorola’s Energy Technology Lab, said the company continues to work on a micro fuel cell prototype that could power police and emergency radios Motorola makes. But he said Motorola would likely outsource the manufacturing of a micro fuel cell. Doing in-house research, he explained, helps ensure that Motorola will “know the right questions” to ask of a prospective manufacturing partner.

Walter Nasdeo, an analyst for the investment firm Ardour Capital Partners, noted that the cost of early devices is a concern. But he said that it was more important for companies like MTI and Medis to get products out the door “to show that they work, and give people the opportunity to touch, feel and get familiar” with such a promising new technology.

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May 24, 2004 — Nanometrix Inc. has a wide range of industries to pursue with its thin-film technology: biotech, chips, photonics, fuel cells — and wrapping paper.

It’s not every day that the gift-giving industry has need for nanotech, but the four-person, Montreal-based startup has piqued the interest of at least one company in the field — which Nanometrix general manager Patrick O’Connor diplomatically calls the “appearance films” business.

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Exactly what Nanometrix is doing for the company, O’Connor won’t say. He does drop one intriguing hint: Nanometrix is also making an almost identical film for another potential customer in the biotech business.

It’s all part of O’Connor’s plan to develop Nanometrix as a platform technology, able to spool out films continuously in layers as slim as 1-nanometer thick. “We’re the plywood of nanotech,” he said. “Now people can go out and build with it.”

Incorporated in 2001, Nanometrix is a spinout from the University of Quebec. The company is the brainchild of Gilles Picard and Juan Schneider, two researchers at the university who developed its technology of “rolling” particles onto a substrate in quick, uninterrupted fashion. The two are now vice presidents of research and technology, respectively.

The technology essentially works like a printing press. Particles are placed in a fluid, which flows down a ramp leading to a dam. The dam forces the particles to pile against each other in an orderly monolayer, which is then squeezed through the dam onto a substrate. The film can be 25-centimeters wide and rolled out continuously as quickly as 1-meter per minute.

That approach differs radically from Langmuir-Blodgett, the dominant technique for making films today. The Langmuir-Blodgett method aligns molecules into a desired formation on a water surface, which then “rains” onto a substrate. In theory, manufacturers would also use vacuum deposition or chemical-vapor deposition to make films as well. None of these approaches, however, allow for as precise, uninterrupted creation of a film as the Nanometrix approach. O’Connor plans to exploit this attribute as the main selling point for his technology.

“We can do all of that on an unlimited width,” he said.

Lance Greggain, a Toronto-based angel investor familiar with Nanometrix, believes the technology has great potential in polymer electronics and similar fields where semiconductors could be layered onto flexible surfaces. Most valuable is its ability to roll out layers precisely, rather than in the inherently random manner of Langmuir-Blodgett raining onto a surface.

“You don’t get that from any other thin film. It enables you to do a lot of things better,” he said.

Greggain gave the example of gate oxides, used to insulate gates from other microchip components; gate oxides are “grown” on a gate rather than deposited precisely. “Well, we only grow it because we can’t deposit it,” Greggain said.

Nanometrix can make multiple layers of different materials, or create patterns by imprinting the pattern on a substrate and then tweaking the particles’ chemistry so they only adhere to that patterned section.

O’Connor gave an example of one Nanometrix customer (who he won’t name) that used the technology to perfect a fuel cell for cars. One component of the fuel cell is a membrane of carbon studded with platinum dots, but the customer could only shave down the membrane to 10 microns — still so expensive that it alone accounted for 20 percent of the device’s cost. Nanometrix fashioned a layer only 0.1-microns thick. The necessary platinum was reduced by 90 percent, and the overall cost of the cell by nearly 20 percent.

According to research from DeutscheBank, the worldwide market for thin films should jump from $27 billion in 2001 to $93 billion by 2010, thanks largely to growth in nanomaterials. O’Connor plans to tackle the materials and biotech sectors first.

Greggain, who has founded five semiconductor companies over the years, said one difficult choice for Nanometrix will be deciding whether to focus its technology on untested, but potentially lucrative, markets like polymer electronics, or on stable markets like automobile components, which have much longer sales cycles and exacting standards for adopting new technologies.

“They do have to conquer those things,” Greggain says. “It’s a delicate balancing act.”

Company file: Nanometrix Inc.
(last updated May 24, 2004)

Company
Nanometrix Inc.

Headquarters
329 rue de la Commune Ouest
Suite 200
Montreal, QC H2Y 2E1
Canada

History
Incorporated in 2001, Nanometrix was spun out of the University of Quebec and co-founded by university researchers Juan Schneider and Gilles Picard. The firm plans to aggressively license its technology and pursue commercialization-focused partnerships.

Industries potentially served
Automotive/Transportation Equipment
Biomedical / Life Sciences: various
Communications: Data Storage / Memory Systems
Communications: Optical Components
Energy / Earth Sciences: Alternate Power Sources
Films
Semiconductors

Small tech-related products and services
Nanometrix has developed nanoscale particle assembly technology that competes with the Langmuir-Blodgett method, a current industry standard.

Management
Patrick T. O’Connor: general manager, chief executive officer
Juan Schneider: vice president of technology
Gilles Picard: vice president of research and development

Financials
Key investors: Development Bank of Canada (BDC), Juan Schneider, Gilles Picard

Selected competitors
Applied Thin Films Inc.
MicroPowder Solutions LLC
nGimat

Barriers to market
Nanometrix is introducing a new technology to compete with an existing standard (as well as other thin-film methods currently in use) in a crowded niche. The company will need to decide whether to target newer markets, where profit is likely to be high but long-term growth is uncertain, or established markets, which are difficult to penetrate but which can offer greater long-term security.

Relevant patents (Canadian Patents Database) Method and apparatus for two dimensional assembly of particles

Recent articles
Nanometrix names CEO

Contact
URL: www.nanometrixinc.com
Phone: 514-343-6111
Fax: 514-343-6331
E-mail: poconnor@nanometrixinc.com

— Research by Gretchen McNeely

May 19, 2004 — Carbon Nanotechnologies Inc. (Profile, News, Web) has teamed up with Chaksa, Minn.-based materials maker Entegris Inc. to commercialize polymer products enhanced by CNI’s carbon nanotubes, according to a news release.

Houston-based CNI’s single-wall nanotubes will be incorporated into Entegris’ products, developed for such applications as semiconductors, data storage devices, pharmaceuticals, and fuel cells. The cylindrical polymers of pure carbon, which are prized for their high strength, low weight and efficient conductivity, are expected to boost the performance of Entegris’ next-generation products, the release said.

May 6, 2004 — Even at this early stage in nanotechnology business development, some labor shortages are starting to show up.

In the short time the nanotech career site Working In Nanotechnology has been active, Nic Mortland, the site’s vice president of sales and marketing, has noted several trends.

“There seems to be a shortage of skilled workers in what I call the middle market at the Ph.D. level, across all science fields with one to five years of commercial experience,” he said. “Every industry has the same issue: quality over quantity.”

Based in Auckland, New Zealand, Working In Nanotechnology is a Web-based bulletin board, launched in March, that provides information on careers, education, and professional training in nanotechnology and related fields.

Mortland said he’s found that employers seem to be unaware of how few really experienced, educated people there are in the various fields surrounding MEMS and nanotechnology. “What I’m finding is a naiveté from startups,” Mortland said. “They think they can find people through universities, but big companies have the universities tied up.”

Although it may seem easy to recruit nanotech employees from a large pool of skilled workers, Mortland said he has found that this is usually not the case. In fact, some employers searching for workers with commercial experience may have to accept students’ summer internships as commercial experience, he said.

Other industry trends the site reveals are “a lot of activity in MEMS, nanotubes and nanomaterials.”

Mortland said that the U.S. government’s decision to cut back on the number of visas granted for high-tech workers would have a huge impact on the industry. He said that the government might believe that U.S. companies should hire Americans, but desired skills may be hard to find. “Or they may want higher pay,” he said. “It’s hard for startups to pay [those salaries]. This is an issue that is really going to impact this industry.”

Other U.S. government agencies are barely aware of the existing nanotech job market. Bureau of Labor Statistics economist Jon Sargent explained why. “That whole nanotechnology field is so new and specialized and thus far, small, that we’re not set up to collect data on it yet,” he said. “It’s still pretty much a research thing.”

Bureau economists don’t keep track of research jobs, either, but Sargent noted that employment in higher education has been growing.

Even though some venture capital has begun to flow to startup nanotechnology companies again, most announcements of jobs in nanotechnology companies are written in the future tense.

In Henrietta, N.Y., for example, in October last year, two technology companies announced a “plan to invest” a total of more than $17 million and to create more than 500 jobs.

The companies had 22 employees at the time, according to a report in the Rochester, N.Y., Democrat and Chronicle. The news included information about a potential $1.3 million in local government grants and low-interest loans.

Contrast that future orientation with Working In Nanotechnology. Before launching the site, Mortland spent about four months in the U.S. to learn what skills employers were looking for, especially in the general science community.

He talked to post-docs and undergrads, asking them how they were going to find jobs out there. He lined up about 2,500 registered job seekers in six months, most from the United States. Now, 450 of those resumes have been sorted for keywords to link to a database.

The database contains fields for nano jobs by science — like biology, chemistry, computer science, materials science, physics and physical sciences. It also lists nano jobs by industry and by technology.

The site has about 70 jobs posted. Positions available include everything from leader of the Center for Integrated Nanotechnologies at Los Alamos National Laboratory to research assistant and fuel cell test engineer.

“Probably the majority of nano jobs are in the academic marketplace, followed by corporate and government labs,” Mortland said. “We have top-, middle- and entry-level jobs.”

He has spoken with more than 150 employers to discuss services. Three early registered user employers include Zyvex Corp. (News, Web), Nanophase Technologies Corp. (Quote, News, Web), and Los Alamos National Laboratory. An active sponsor of the site is the nanotech think tank Foresight Institute of Palo Alto, Calif.

The privately supported site was able to get a running start because founders Scott Matieson and Hayley Roberts already had other job-match sites for New Zealand, United Kingdom, Asian and Australian jobs. Working In Nanotechnology is a subsidiary of their company, Working In Ltd.

Matieson and Roberts founded the site after noticing that there were no big science sites addressing the problem of finding skilled science workers. “That gave us the confidence to make a centralized platform by academic and business fields.”

In addition to Working In’s site, the U.S. National Nanotechnology Initiative has a page devoted to nanotechnology careers on its Web site.

In 1977, the average automobile contained $110 worth of electronics. By 2003, the electronics content was $1,510 per vehicle. This is expected to reach $2,285 by 2013. The turning point in automotive electronics was government regulation in the 1970s, mandating emissions control and fuel economy. The complex fuel control required could not be accomplished using traditional mechanical systems. These government regulations, coupled with increasing semiconductor-computing power at decreasing cost, led to an increasing array of automotive electronics. The increased electrical power requirements in automotive systems spurred the push to 42V systems, which are now beginning to be used.

The operating temperature of the electronics is a function of location, power dissipation by the electronics and the thermal design. The automotive electronics industry defines high-temperature electronics as electronics operating above 125°C. The underhood automotive environment is harsh and current trends in the automotive electronics industry will be pushing the temperature envelope for electronic components. The desire to place engine control units on the engine and transmission control units either on or in the transmission will push the ambient temperature above 125°C. However, extreme cost pressures, increasing reliability demands (10 years/150,000 miles) and the cost of field failures (recalls, liability, customer loyalty) will make the shift to higher temperatures incremental. The coolest spots on engine or in transmission will be used first. These large metal bodies provide considerable heat sinking to reduce temperature rise caused by power dissipation in the control unit.


Table 1. The five major categories of automotive electronics.
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The transition to X-by-wire technology, replacing mechanical and hydraulic systems with electromechanical systems, will require more power electronics. Integration of power transistors and smart power devices into the electromechanical actuator will require power devices to operate at 175 to 200°C. Hybrid electric vehicles and fuel cell vehicles will also drive the demand for higher-temperature power electronics. In the case of hybrid electric and fuel cell vehicles, the high temperature will result from power dissipation, not ambient conditions. The alternates to high-temperature devices are thermal management systems, which add weight and cost.

The number of sensors in vehicles is increasing as more electrically controlled systems are added. Many of these sensors must work in high temperature environments. The harshest applications are exhaust gas sensors and cylinder pressure or combustion sensors.

DaimlerChrysler, Eaton Corp. and Auburn University jointly published a summary of automotive high-temperature requirements (Table 2). The current DaimlerChrysler on-engine temperature specification is -40 to +165°C, and the in-transmission specification is -40 to +150°C.


Table 2. Mechatronic maximum temperature ranges.
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While electronics are expected to survive high-temperature exposure, it is not necessary for them to survive for thousands of hours at the maximum temperature.

Device and packaging technologies for high-temperature automotive electronics provide an exciting area for development during the next decade.

R. WAYNE JOHNSON may be contacted at Auburn University, 162 Broun Hall/ECE Dept., Auburn, AL 36849; (334) 844-1880; johnson@eng.auburn.edu.

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DANVILLE, Va., April 13, 2004 — Small tech is causing a ripple in this sleepy Virginia hamlet, which has grown accustomed to absorbing negative economic news.

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So when Luna Innovations (News, Web), a Blacksburg, Va., company, announced in March it would begin manufacturing special nanomaterials here, locals understandably were elated.

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Luna is investing nearly $6.5 million to retrofit a 400,000-square-foot tobacco warehouse for high-volume production of nanomaterials based on its patented Trimetaspheres, which are hollow carbon molecules that enclose various metal and rare earth elements.

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Luna expects to initially hire 54 full-time workers to man at least two shifts once the plant ramps up production this fall. The company will manufacture carbonaceous nanomaterials and nanocomposite thin films for a variety of industries.

Topping the list are improved contrast agents for use in magnetic resonance imaging tests. Other commercial applications include materials for vehicle parts, stain-resistant textiles, ship hull coatings, lubricants and fuel cell components.

“We’re now able to produce very large quantities of extremely pure nanomaterials — enough to do full-scale clinical trials as well as develop other applications,” said Kent Murphy, Luna’s founder.

Although job growth will be incremental, local businesses are optimistic Luna could spur similar ventures. “The nano work that Luna is doing provides an avenue for functionality for our textile manufacturing in Danville. We think there are probably (other) areas of mutual interest,” said Linwood Wright, vice president of quality for Dan River Textiles Inc., the largest textile maker in Danville with about 3,000 employees.

Despite the best efforts of business and government leaders, Danville has been unable to rouse itself from an economic slumber tied to recent devastating losses in textiles and tobacco. Unemployment in the city of 53,000 people hit 8.4 percent in March, highest among Virginia’s cities.

In choosing Danville, Luna eschewed manufacturing sites in Maryland and North Carolina. Danville’s work force and history as a manufacturing center played key roles in the decision. “Some of the applications of our technology are complex, but the equipment and machinery used to manufacture the materials is actually quite simple,” Murphy said.

Carbonaceous nanomaterials are a third form of carbon behind diamond and graphite. Composed of up to 500 carbon atoms, they can be arranged in the shapes of spheres or tubes. Functionality is added by placing atoms of different elements inside the carbon cage, including various metals.

Luna patented its Trimetasphere molecule with help from a $2 million development grant from the National Institute of Standards and Technology. The special molecule encages 80 carbon atoms around a core of one nitrogen atom, which is stabilized by three metal ions. They were discovered by Harry Dorn of Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, which licensed the technology to Luna.

Murphy said Luna’s Trimetasphere cages can survive in the presence of oxygen up to 400 degrees Celsius. Scientists at Washington University in St. Louis researched the Trimetaspheres and found that “our molecule is up to 25 times better than the material used now for MRIs.”

The key difference is in the chemical structure of Luna’s molecule. The dominant MRI contrast agent, gadolinium, is a highly toxic rare earth element that gets injected into patients. That presents a potential hazard as the gadolinium seeps into the bloodstream before being excreted through the kidneys.

Luna’s carbon cage entraps most of the gadolinium and prevents it from flowing into the bloodstream. That property also means the cages could be functionalized for advanced cell-targeting therapy in diagnosing cancerous tumors and other ailments. MRI contrast agents represent a $2 billion-a-year industry that is expected to grow 20 percent annually during the next several years, Murphy says.

Niskayuna, N.Y.-based General Electric Co. could be among Luna’s early development partners. The $134 billion diversified services company already has federal grants to research improved MRI technologies. Murphy says Luna and GE have agreed to form a joint development partnership, though no contract has been formally signed.

Luna plans to shift its existing Blacksburg production gradually to its Danville plant, situated in the city’s historic Tobacco Warehouse District. Companies locating there are eligible for tax breaks and other incentives. Helped by funding from Virginia and Danville governments, Luna is developing job-retraining programs to deal with an expected rash of applicants. Some people applied within days of the company’s announcement.

“We’re going to look for people who are adaptable and have attention to detail, and train them on our manufacturing process,” says Charlie Gause, Luna’s manufacturing director.

Luna’s expansion may signal the beginning of a national trend. Nathan Swami, a University of Virginia professor who spearheads the Initiative for Nanotechnology in Virginia, points to predictions that nanotechnology will produce 800,000 to 900,000 new U.S. jobs by 2015. Companies like Luna position Virginia to gain as many as 30,000 nanomanufacturing jobs.

“The future will be in nanocomposites, which get added to items as small as a safety pin to as large as a spaceship,” Swami said.

Luna Innovations has spun out five subsidiaries. Aside from thin films and nano-materials, Luna also markets tiny sensors for oil wells, fiber optics, aviation and numerous other industries.