Category Archives: Energy Storage

August 27, 2007 – Months after initiating a policy that requires government approval to invest in or export certain technologies, the Korean government has narrowed its definition to 40 core “technologies of national interest” in a variety of industries, with DRAM and NAND flash chipmaking at the top of the list.

A committee working with surveys and recommendations from the Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Energy, the Ministry of Science and Technology, the Ministry of Information and Communication and the Ministry of Construction and Transportation came up with the final list of 40, according to the Chosun Ilbo. Most notably, the law protects the technology for designing/processing/assembling/inspecting DRAM (=80nm) and NAND flash (=70nm) processes. Other technologies under the law relate to vehicle fuel cells, FINEX steel, and shipbuilding for liquid natural gas carriers.

Four technologies were pinpointed in electronics and electrical engineering, eight from the automobile industry, six from the steel industry, seven from shipbuilding, four from nuclear power generation, six from information and telecommunications and four from the space industry, the paper noted.

The government likely laid down the law in these areas to help stem a “technology drain” ongoing for several years, and which has bled into more leading-edge areas, notes Gartner Dataquest analyst Chang-Soo Ki in a report. Under this new policy, any technology that has received R&D support from the government needs committee approval before it can be sold or moved abroad. Any designated technology that is purely private still needs to report any transaction to the government — though if the technology is considered to have an impact on Korean security or economy the government can nullify the technology export, or require it be returned to its original condition. Failure to adhere to these steps could mean risking the same penalty assigned to industry spies, the analyst firm wrote.

“With this law in effect, Samsung Electronics and Hynix Semiconductor will likely be directly affected with regard to co-investing, selling or moving their technology abroad,” the Gartner analyst noted, adding that the law probably wouldn’t derail any upgrade plans for operations already overseas.

August 24, 2007 — The U.S. Patent Office has granted Integrated Sensing Systems Inc. (ISSYS) a utility patent (US 7,228,735) titled “Fluid sensing device with integrated bypass and process therefor.” A major hurdle in commercializing microfluidic devices has been their limiting low flow rates, the company says. This patent describes a new method and design which allow microfluidic sensors to monitor and test relatively high flow rates of fluids. And, the company asserts, this invention greatly reduces the complexity of microfluidic packaging for high-flow applications.

Dr. Nader Najafi, ISSYS CEO, stated that “this patent is an important element in ISSYS’ comprehensive IP portfolio for fluidic applications. Our patents play a key role in providing major competitive barriers to entry at different levels from processing, to packaging, to final applications.” ISSYS

This patent also goes into detail on applying this technology to fuel cells including Direct Methanol Fuel Cells (DMFCs) and reformed fuel cells. The methanol sensor is based on ISSYS’ Micro Electro Mechanical System (MEMS) technology. The sensor is used to improve the efficiency of the DMFC by keeping the methanol to water concentration at an optimum level throughout the operating life of the fuel cell.

Among the literally hundreds of presentations lined up for this week’s American Chemical Society fall national meeting (Boston, MA, Aug. 19-23) are talks about chemical advancements in nearly every field imaginable, from medicine to petroleum and agriculture, and materials science. Here’s a quick rundown of several papers of interest to the semiconductor industry, including research into nanoimprint lithography, porous low-k dielectrics, and photovoltaic cells.

Nanoimprint lithography

A new strategy to achieve an anti-adhesion surface for the simple fabrication of nanostructures with high fidelity, applicable to all types of molds, will be discussed by Mihee Kim et al., Division of Nano Sciences and Department of Chemistry, Ewha Womans U., Seoul, South Korea. Although perfluoro-groups have the lowest surface energy, the adhesion energy, represented by peel fracture energy, of an intrinsic PDMS surface is lower than that of a surface treated with perfluoro-groups. This presentation will introduce a simple fabrication route to a highly transparent super-hydrophobic flexible mold coated with PDMS.

Burcin Erenturk and Kenneth R. Carter, Department of Polymer Science and Engineering, U. of Massachusetts/Amherst, MA, will discuss their successful imprint into porogen-containing low molecular weight, chain extendible polymethylsilsesquioxanes (PMSSQ) SOG. The thermally decomposable porogens are aliphatic polyester-based.

Many monomers that have shown promise for low wavelength lithography have proven difficult to incorporate into polymers of the structure typically used in the lithography industry. Jacob R. Adams et al. from the Willson Lab in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, U. of Texas/Austin, will show polymers synthesized by the formation of a norbornene based acetal backbone, which offers an alternate route to incorporation of these materials. The synthesis and evaluation of a series of new, imageable acetal polymers for general lithography will be presented.

Porous low-k dielectrics

CheongYang Koh et al. from the Institute for Soldier Nanotechnologies and Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, will review periodic structures in 1,2 and 3 dimensions at the sub-micron and nanoscale, which exhibit interesting behavior with photons and phonons at these length scales. Presenters will discuss interference lithography to form such periodic polymer/air structures for photonics and phononics.

Methods for porosity characterization of porous SiLK dielectric films will be examined by Brian G. Landes et al. from the Dow Chemical Co., Veeco, and the Synchrotron Research Center at Northwestern U. Due to the complex nature of the porous structure, multiple on-wafer methods are being investigated to quantify the porosity: ellipsometry, small angle X-ray scattering (SAXS), X-ray reflectivity (XRR), and atomic force microscopy. Void fraction, pore size and size distribution, pore morphology and uniformity across a porous SiLK film can be measured.

Mikhail R. Baklanov et al., IMEC, Leuven, Belgium, will look at plasma damage to low dielectric constant (low-k) films formed in different plasma reactors, with observed phenomena “well described” by a diffusion-recombination model. The depth of damage, they will report, can be significantly reduced by generation of surface active centers — by VUV photons emitted in a He plasma — that increase the probability of recombination of active radicals.

Barry J. Bauer et al., National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), Gaithersburg, MD; Penn State U.; and Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa, Israel will discuss their work examining pore size distribution (PSD) using small angle neutron scattering (SANS) and x-ray reflectivity porosimetry (XRP). SANS measures the angular dependence of scattered neutrons, and models are applied to the data to extract PSD information. XRP measures the adsorption of a probe molecule as a function of pressure and PSD can be extracted by application of thermodynamic models.

Photovoltaic solar cells

Prashant V. Kamat et al. from the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, U. of Notre Dame, and IN Argonne National Laboratory, Center for Nanoscale Materials, Argonne, IL, will explore the photoresponse of TiO2 nanoarray in the visible spectrum by attaching CdSe quantum dots.

Lead sulfide (PbS) quantum dots (QDs) offer potential as an alternative sensitizer in a Graetzel solar cell, because of the many advantages they have over organic dyes, including multiple electron generation (MEG), photo stability, and a controllable spectral absorption range which is tunable through particle size. Chunrong Xiong et al., NanoTech Institute, U. of Texas/Dallas, Richardson, TX, will discuss the preparation of TiO2 nanotubes and nanofibers, which were then doped with PbS QDs of controlled size to control the spectral absorption range.

Work with SnS nanocrystals synthesized from a single source precursor in oleylamine at elevated temperature will be discussed by Dmitry S. Koktysh et al., Vanderbilt Institute of Nanoscale Science and Engineering, Vanderbilt U., Nashville, TN. The SnS nanocrystals’ shape and size can be tuned by controlling the reaction temperature and time, and the nature of the stabilizing ligands. Comparison between experimental optical band gap values shows evidence of quantum confinement of SnS nanocrystals, and prepared low toxicity SnS nanocrystals display strong absorption in the visible and near-infrared spectral regions — making them promising candidates for solar cell energy conversion devices with tunable optical properties. — E.K. and J.M.

August 2, 2007 — BASF Corp. and CogniTek Management Systems Inc. have signed a cooperation agreement to examine whether the combined use of supercritical carbon dioxide and ionic liquids enables particularly efficient use of low-temperature heat sources for power generation. The attraction for this effort is belief that a process employing the unique properties of supercritical carbon dioxide and ionic liquids could transform low-quality heat having comparatively low temperatures — including solar, geothermal, combustion waste heat, and bottom cycling of existing power plants — into high-value power generation. The result would be a combined power generation system with integral heating and cooling co-products capable of saving substantial amounts of energy.

“Today’s rising energy costs dramatically increase the importance of energy conversion efficiency and thermal waste heat recovery, said Michael Gurin, founder of CogniTek and president of Rexorce Thermionics, Inc. Rexorce is commercializing the Thermafficient thermal engine, which is based on the NASA licensed absorption heat pump. “By taking advantage of the unique properties of ionic liquids and supercritical carbon dioxide, we believe that with the next-generation system we will be able to achieve higher power generation efficiencies and/or superior returns on capital.”

“Ionic liquids are the perfect partner for super-critical carbon dioxide as the working fluid for high efficiency heat transfer, said Dr. Megan Turner, Business Development Manager of the BASF Intermediates New Business Development unit in North America. “Non-volatile, ionic liquids possess extraordinary physical properties that provide great efficiency.”

Ionic liquids are a relatively new class of attractive high performance liquids that typically are not flammable, do not evaporate, and exhibit high thermal stability. BASF says it is the first company to use ionic liquids in a commercial scale operation; the company is pursuing technology solutions to exploit the unique characteristics of ionic liquids, including providing access to its proprietary commercial scale Basil technology that can be used for cellulose (Cellionic) and metal processing, metal plating, extractive distillation, liquid-liquid extraction, acid scavenging and acid catalysis. BASF provides ionic liquids in gram to ton quantities with its Basionic portfolio.

CogniTek is an advanced materials technology firm specializing in applications benefiting from superior conductivity. CogniTek’s materials expertise is in the conversion of nano-scale materials into enhanced fluids, phase change materials, and polymeric composites into respectively nanofluids, nano-PCMs and nano-composites. Novel application methods promise conversion of the resulting materials into optimal thermal management and high conductivity solutions.

(July 12, 2007) SAN JOSE, CA &#151 DEK appointed Aram Kardjian as western regional business manger, promoting developing applications such as materials deposition in semiconductor packaging, medical electronics, fuel cells, and other markets. He will also be responsible for customer support, and implementing and supporting growth targets and corporate development in the western U.S.

July 5, 2007 — Catilin, a biodiesel production company, has raised $3 million in Series A financing led by MDV-Mohr Davidow Ventures, an early-stage Silicon Valley-based venture capital firm. The funds will be used to build out a pilot production facility, continue groundbreaking research, and build the Catilin team.

Catilin has developed a process for biofuels production that promises to greatly reduce the cost of biodiesel, and to make biodiesel cost competitive with diesel without government subsidies. The company claims that its nanotechnology process allows biodiesel producers to get maximum profit from a broad range of feedstocks using fewer processing steps, which leads to lower overall costs, and greatly reduces water consumption and environmental contaminants. The process works with existing biodiesel production facilities.

The technology was developed by Iowa State University chemistry professor, and U.S. DOE Ames Laboratory senior scientist Victor Lin. The company will use the Biomass Energy Conversion Center facility (BECON) at Iowa State for its pilot biodiesel production.

A June workshop hosted by the Department of Energy (DOE) aimed to set industry-driven R&D priorities that will yield significant energy savings in manufacturing and product use.

The workshop produced recommendations for applied research, development, deployment, and business practices that the DOE will incorporate into a Nanomanufacturing for Energy Efficiency Roadmap. The road map, in turn, will help set DOE funding priorities and guide industrial R&D.

The event drew researchers and executives from large corporations (Air Products, DuPont, GE, Boeing, PPG, Intel, Dow), smaller nanotech innovators (SDC Materials, Nantero, Nanosolar, Aspen Aerogels), universities, and national labs; Veeco represented tool and equipment providers on the conference agenda.

The meeting explored the use of nanotechnologies to reduce our need for traditional energy sources in manufacturing, transportation, lighting, cooling/heating, and other applications-and how to leverage nano to maximize energy storage, transmission, and production.

Productive honesty

I was struck by the honesty of the first day’s speakers and panelists, many of whom expressed frustration over slow technology adoption. That set the stage for open, productive dialog the next day.

Although this conference centered on energy, many recurring issues were specific to nanotechnology and not to the energy industry. This confirms-for those who wonder about the value of scale-focused versus application-focused discussion-the opportunity to make advances across many verticals by addressing a common set of “small tech” issues.

According to one speaker, 80% of U.S. government funding for nanotechnology goes to basic science research while 20% goes to applied research-a contrast to more applied-research funding in Europe and Asia. This begs the question, “Will the difference help U.S. industry in the long run by ensuring a greater pool of knowledge, or is there a need to invest more into shorter-term applications?”

Warning: Don’t avoid EH&S

If the nanotech ecosystem wants to bury its head in the sand regarding environment, health, and safety (EH&S) issues, this workshop did a good job of tugging at its tail feathers. The large corporate representatives stated clearly that they are holding back nanotechnology implementation because of unknown toxicity and an unclear regulatory future-but did not address what specific actions need to occur before they proceed.

Unfortunately, the subject of EH&S was taken off the discussion table in the nanomaterials breakout the next day. The issue is too large and not within the DOE purview. But clearly, if nanotechnology is going to play a role in solving energy efficiency and production needs, everyone with a vested interest should help produce a solution.

Scaling and reliability

Besides the open questions surrounding EH&S, the group pegged scaling and reliability as the biggest challenges to nanomaterials market adoption. OEMs need steady supply, consistent quality (including both different suppliers and among batches from the same supplier), and cost reductions.

Steady supply is difficult as many nanomaterials companies are young and not on firm financial ground-and acceptable secondary suppliers are hard to come by because of intellectual property protections and major differences in the delivered product.

Regarding consistency, the smallest of variations can change application performance-and that feeds into characterization issues. What standards should be applied, what are the best methods for testing, and what tools can provide reliable measurements both inline and for quality control? Having more characterization companies in the breakout would have helped to answer these questions.

Scaling volume for cost reduction requires capital investment, but nanomaterials companies cannot easily build for production capacity without signed orders. Also, current production techniques typically require adding same-size manufacturing units rather than larger production equipment-which diminishes a company’s ability to reduce capital costs and pass savings to customers.

There are still many hurdles to overcome to get advanced nanomaterials into the mass market. Workshops and conferences that can define key challenges and set goals to overcome them will help speed commercialization for the entire sector. But these efforts won’t progress without your participation. Play your part!

Patti Glaza is vice president and publisher at Small Times. She can be reached at [email protected].


The energy-harvesting ESG-LINK promises to power a sensing system indefinitely without batteries. (Photo: MicroStrain)

June 14, 2007 — MicroStrain, Inc. says its miniaturized energy-harvesting nodes operated successfully in the first-ever flight test of wireless strain sensors for damage tracking of rotating helicopter parts and other critical dynamic components.

MicroStrain’s ESG-LINK energy-harvesting sensing node features a precision time keeper, non-volatile memory for on-board data logging, and frequency agile IEEE 802.15.4 transceiver. Sampling rates, sample durations, sensor offsets, sensor gains and on-board shunt calibration are all wirelessly programmable. It promises to power a sensing system indefinitely, without the need for batteries, by converting the component’s cyclic strains into DC power using piezoelectric materials (patents issued and pending).

Recent flight tests on a Bell Helicopter Model 412 show that MicroStrain’s nodes will operate continually, without batteries, even under low energy generation conditions of straight and level helicopter flight. By continuously monitoring the strains on rotating components, the nodes can record operational loads, compute metal fatigue, and estimate remaining component life.

MicroStrain’s latest adaptive energy harvesting wireless sensors can sample pitch link static and dynamic loads at a rate of 32 samples/sec, then communicate these wireless data into the helicopter cabin, while consuming only 250 microwatts. Compared to conventional Wheatstone bridge signal conditioning electronics (which draw 72 milliwatts), MicroStrain’s node delivers an improvement of 288 fold.

By Hugh G. Willett, Small Times contributing editor

June 11, 2007 — The ability to lay down ultra-thin layers of a variety of nanoscale materials is primarily being used to increase the wear resistance of materials used in industrial, medical, and automotive applications, according to Dr. Tim VanderWood, executive director of MVA Scientific Consultants, Duluth Ga. But the opportunities in nanocoating will grow with the increasing capabilities to create thinner layers of a wider variety of materials within tighter tolerances.

MVA uses tools such as transmission electron microscopes (TEM)s to measure nanoscale coatings on a variety of materials used to manufacture glass, car paints and even variable pigments in dollar bills, VanderWood said. “During the R&D phase you can call on our lab to characterize the film cross section,” he noted. “We are also used in manufacturing for quality control.”

MVA has been working with customers helping to characterize a variety of color pigment-related nanocoating technologies that are already in production. The company has helped the U. S. Treasury Department develop variable pigments that are used in paper money and has also worked with paint companies to develop automobile paints with nano-layered pigments and coatings that can change colors when observed from different angles.

“We’re also working with architectural glass companies to develop nanoscale coatings on glass in multiple layers,” he said. These ultra-thin coatings can add UV protection, color and other properties to the glass, he explained.

Among the biggest challenges in the future of nanocoating is the capability to make sure the layers bond properly with the substrate, VanderWood added.

Another example of where nanocoating technology is headed can be found in C3 International LLC of Alpharetta, Ga., which has developed a technology platform to lay down at low temperatures on any inorganic substrate as many as 58 different elements or combination of elements in layers as thin as a few nanometers within tolerances of as little as 2 to 4%.

The C3 technology is currently used primarily to create thin layers of highly wear-resistant materials such as cubic zirconium that extend the life and increase the speed capabilities of industrial tooling. C3’s nanocoating techniques can deposit cubic zirconium crystals finer and denser than other methods such as CVD allow: 3 nanometers compared with 50 nanometers.

And the future offers more exciting possibilities. The ability to maintain tight tolerances at low cost is key to breaking into the new applications where C3 will compete against ion-implantation, chemical vapor deposition and other established technologies, said Mark Deininger, founder and CEO of C3.

C3 is a $100 million company today. In four years the company expects a valuation in the range of $2 billion, largely the result of licensing the technology for use in new applications in electronics, space research and energy, Deininger said.

Three key target areas are meta-materials, multi-ferrics, and layered dielectric and conductive materials. C3 expects that within several years, its technology will be used in applications including CMOS metal interconnect, copper interconnect, flash memory, magnetic memories, batteries, and capacitors.

The C3 technology is also much faster and less expensive in a manufacturing environment than techniques such as growing layers on the substrate, Deininger said.

Deininger confirmed that a C3 is addressing a key challenge of bonding the deposited layers to the substrate. A problem with nanocoatings is that they sometimes flake off because of the difference in coefficient of thermal expansion between the layers and the substrate. The technology C3 is using can actually infuse 40 nm to 60 nm into the substrate, he said.

“It’s almost like being able to create a new element,” he added.

The C3 business model is based on technology licensing and partnering. The company is working with Honeywell on petrochemical applications such as a molecular sieve for catalytic processes and with General Electric Energy Systems on solid oxide fuel cells where it is necessary to lay down nanoscale thin layers of electrolyte. The fuel cells have applications in energy research and space exploration.

C3 has proven the concept of its technologies through research at multiple government facilities, and in the coming year will open a 3,000 sq. ft. branch office near Oak Ridge National Lab dedicated to nanotechnology.

June 6, 2007 — Nanoexa, a provider of high-performance clean energy storage solutions, has hired Dr. Deepak Srivastava as Chief Technology Officer. With more than a decade of computational modeling experience at the NASA Ames Center for Nanotechnology, Srivastava will be responsible for overseeing technical staff as well as R&D at Nanoexa.

As co-founder and CTO of Junius Tech, a computational materials design company that later merged into Nanostellar, Dr. Srivastava helped build and advise the technical team, investigate future new product and technology areas, and provide input into Nanostellar technology development. Over the past ten years as the Senior Lead Scientist and Group Leader of Computational Materials Design and Nanotechnology at NASA Ames, he has earned a long list of accolades including the Feynman Prize in Nanotechnology Theory, the Veridian Medal Paper Awards, The Eric Reissener Medal, and the Computer Sciences Corporation Award for Technical Excellence.

Last month, Nanoexa delivered new technology to Decktron, its publicly traded subsidiary in Korea, to be used in conjunction with existing intellectual property from Argonne National Laboratory. Initially targeting the radio control toys market with its new safe, high-powered lithium batteries, Nanoexa plans to expand its reach to serve the power tool and HEV markets in the near future.