Category Archives: Energy Storage

By Jack Mason
Small Times Correspondent

Feb. 18, 2002 — Reno, Nev., calls itself the “Biggest Little City in the World.”

The city is also the home of what might be the biggest little company in the nanoparticles market, Altair Nanotechnologies, the new name of Altair International, pending shareholder approval.

What’s the big deal about Altair? On Friday, the company reported advances in a solid oxide fuel cell

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The reactor room at Altair Nanotechnologies,
where the company is thinking big — producing
nanocrystal particles of high quality, in high
volumes and at a low cost per pound.
made with its nanomaterials and a stepped-up schedule to test a prototype.

Also, Altair’s core patent for making titanium dioxide pigment particles is likely to be approved in a few weeks. If it is, the company will control a flexible process for making literally tons of nanoscale materials in a range of types, sizes and shapes.

Indeed, the company is thinking big — producing nanocrystal particles of high quality, in high volumes and at a low cost per pound. The crystals could be used for fuel cells, batteries, thermal coatings and chemical catalysts. They might even help create a paint that cleans itself.

At the same time, Altair’s numbers aren’t exactly big-time: 2001 revenues were just $100,000 and its stock has fallen from around $3 to $1.35 in 12 months. Listed on the Nasdaq stock market for nearly five years, Altair employs only 25 people. What’s more, in 2001 it spent nearly $10 million, and about $5 million the previous year, on operations and R&D.

Still, “Altair has real potential in very significant market categories,” says Neil Gordon, a partner and nanotech analyst with Sygertech, a technology consulting firm in Montreal.

Altair’s market potential centers on a pigment process that could generate small mountains of nanoscale titanium dioxide, lithium titanate spinel and yttrium-stabilized zirconium (YSZ). Of course, “large” volume in the frontier field of nanomaterials is all relative. Altair says it can currently produce 200 tons a year and can expand to 1,500 tons. Producers of non-nanoscale titanium dioxide such as DuPont make as much as 1,000 tons a day.

The company says that the stabilized zirconia used in its solid oxide fuel cell pilot solves the problem of electrode and cathode layers tending to break apart under heating and cooling. Solid oxide fuel cells are one of several competing types, with PEM (proton exchange membrane) designs from companies like Ballard Power Systems Inc. more widely known. Solid oxide fuel cells run at significantly higher temperatures and take longer to reach operating temperature than PEM designs, so aren’t likely to power vehicles.

But solid oxide cells may be cheaper to mass-produce. They would be even cheaper if Altair’s nanomaterials can keep the cost of a fuel cell’s core to $100-$200 per kilowatt, as it thinks it can. By comparison, Altair President Bill Long says, solid oxide fuel cells that General Electric is working on cost about $1,500 per kilowatt.

Stabilized zirconia is also used as a coating to protect turbine blades in power plants and jet engines from intense heat. Altair has filed a patent for its nanosize YSZ material.

With its lithium titanate spinel (spinel refers to the phase of the crystal) nanomaterial, Altair is looking for a piece of the $6 billion market for rechargeable batteries. The company says that charging and discharging rates in lithium ion batteries built around its technology would be 10 to 100 times higher than existing batteries. It also claims that such nanopowered batteries could be recharged in as little as a minute.

In November, Altair signed a co-marketing and development agreement with FMC Lithium, the world’s leading producer of lithium compounds.

The pigment process that produces these materials was originally conceived for making titanium dioxide, the “white pigment” widely used in making paints. Pigment is a $9 billion industry. Ken Lyon, president of Altair Nanomaterials (the production unit of Altair), says the existing market for true nanoscale titanium dioxide is about 3,000 tons and includes cosmetics such as sunscreens, as well as thermal coatings, environmental catalysts for water treatment or auto emissions, as well as paint.

Indeed, Lyon and Rudi Moerck, Altair’s new vice president of business development, describe a range of applications for nanoscale Ti02, from absorbing electrons — as the particles do in sunscreens or UV protective coatings — to the opposite mechanism, harvesting electrons for producing electricity in a solar panel.

They can even envision a paint or surface made with nano Ti02 that cleans itself — electrochemically “burns off” a smudge or fingerprint, or keeps itself sterile by zapping bacteria with electrons.

Altair acquired the technology and the pilot production plant in Reno in 1999 from BHP Minerals — now BHP Billiton — for $9 million.

Altair founder Bill Long, who has a Ph.D. in minerals economics and has been involved in a variety of mining enterprises, says that BHP decided to sell when new management sold off nonessential assets in a back-to-basics reorganization.

BHP’s process, then unpatented but proprietary, was conceived for industrial-scale production. It starts with industrial sands of titanium and iron oxides that Altair can buy economically by the ton. These commodity “feedstocks” are dissolved in hydrochloric acid, and then purified to isolate and concentrate the titanium dioxide.

The TiO2 intermingles with dopants — or impurities — that help control how particles crystallize, and forms a dense, thin film. The film is then heated slowly in a sophisticated oven called a calcinator, held at temperature for a proscribed length of time and carefully cooled.

According to Lyon, production from a “dense film” offers lower costs and unique advantages — such as more uniform particle size — over other nanoparticle processes. Lyon says that the company’s process recovers hydrogen chloride for recycling back into the hydrochloric acid bath, and that the principal byproduct of the operation is iron oxide, which can be resold for use in making stains and fertilizers.

Lyon says that the company has several customers for its Ti02 products and is in active discussions with other large companies. The increase in interest and activity in the nanomaterials market from just a year ago is, says Lyon, “like night and day.”

Sygertech’s Gordon, also on the advisory board of CMP Cientifica’s “Nanotechnology Opportunity Report,” due out Feb. 22, notes that “their process doesn’t require a lot of expensive, esoteric equipment such as lasers and vacuum chambers.” He does believe that with only 25 people working on a wide range of products, the company may be stretched a little thin.

Gordon, who has an MBA as well as an undergraduate degree in metallurgical engineering, points out that many companies are developing materials and technologies for fuel cells and batteries. “The optimal solutions may not be lithium titanate spinel. They may not be nano.”

He also observes that many production technologies exist for producing titanium-based products, nanoscale or otherwise. All are beholden to economic fundamentals. “The ideal one is that which uses the least amount of energy or raw material costs, for the level of product purity you need.”

What nanotechnology companies like Altair need right now, Gordon contends, “is to find low-hanging fruit, products in a market niche where the cost or performance advantage they offer is enough to achieve sustainable profitability.”

By Guy Paisner
Small Times Correspondent

LONDON, Dec. 21, 2001 — An ambitious plan for a nanotechnology research center focused around the University of Birmingham is at the heart of a U.K. regional development strategy that hopes to revitalize the birthplace of the industrial revolution.

The launch earlier this week the I2 Nanotech Centre is the first phase of a vision to establish the West Midlands as a global force in the commercial exploitation of nanotechnology. The center will focus on nanoparticles and nano-engineering, with applications ranging from microfabricated devices and novel materials, through to drug delivery systems, dentistry and food production.

Having raised more than $15.9 million in public funding, the new center intends to bridge the nano-engineering expertise of the university with the commercial research of big pharma partners such as AstraZeneca and GlaxoSmithKline. Other partners include QinetiQ, the commercial wing of the U.K. government’s defense research and development organization and CLRC, the parent organization of the world famous Rutherford Appleton Laboratory in Oxfordshire.

Vishal Nayar, business group manager for microsystems and engineering at QinetiQ, will work with the I2 Nanotech Centre on a collaborative basis. “The Midlands has a history of precision engineering and technology, which is allied to the microsystems world,” Nayar said. “It needs to renew its core competence and setting up the nanotech center will be a core part of that process.”

The center has already received planning permission for a building that it hopes to open in the next 12-18 months. It will house multidisciplinary teams organized through an incubator business model that provides in-house business, finance and management expertise designed to accelerate the technology transfer of university intellectual property.

Professor Graham Davies, head of Birmingham University’s School of Engineering and chief executive of the I2 Nanotech Centre, is keen to stress the practical and commercial nature of the project. “This is not about being good academic scientists. We want to engineer products and create new jobs.”

Birmingham University has already spun out two nanotech startups, making it one of the United Kingdom’s leaders in university nanotechnology transfer. Hybrid Systems uses a nanoparticle bound with a polymer to target specific forms of cancer. The company was formed in 1998 by Len Seymour in the Institute for Cancer Studies at the university. In June 2000 Hybrid Systems received around $362,000 of seed funding from angel investors and it has just signed a licensing deal with a U.K. pharmaceuticals company.

Adelan, a developer of nanoparticle catalysts for fuel cells, was founded in 1996 by Kevin Kendall and spun out of the university with an undisclosed amount of angel funding in April 2001.

The center plans to spin out 70 companies over a 10-year period with the long-term aim of creating up to 500 nanotechnology-related jobs for the region. Brian More, business development manager at the university’s School of Physics and Astronomy, says that nanotech has applications across a huge breadth of the economy but he is particularly excited about opportunities in the bionanotechnology arena.

“We have a lead in bionanotechnology due to the strong academic and industrial base here and the launch event demonstrated that there is strong interest from financial institutions and large corporates.”

One example of the research undertaken at the university in the bionanotechnology arena is the work led by Professor James Callow in the School of Biosciences. Callow is interested in the use of biomolecules and cellular systems in the fabrication of tissue and cellular scaffolds, and tissue bio-adhesive composites.

A particular area of interest is the study of bioadhesive nanocomposites produced by marine organisms. Many organisms in the marine environment secure themselves to underwater surfaces through the production of bioadhesives. These materials can withstand the high sheer forces of turbulent marine environments but their ability to function over a very wide range of temperatures and salt levels suggests important applications such as tissue adhesives and in tissue engineering.

Advantage West Midlands, the regional development agency, has also pledged some funding for the I2 Nanotech Centre as part of its plan to develop a regional science corridor. The West Midlands historic dependence on traditional manufacturing industries has made the region vulnerable to competition from cheaper international markets.

Forty years ago, just under 50 percent of the workforce was employed in manufacturing. Now, that figure is now just under 25 percent. Michael Thompson, a strategist at Advantage West Midlands, sees the I2 Nanotech Centre as a potential flagship for the proposed high-tech corridor and an opportunity to bring in a raft of material-based technologies to help diversify the region’s manufacturing base.

“We need new markets and opportunities that leverage off our talent in engineering and we need to move away from volume commodity production of low value companies to higher value components and manufactured products.”

Thompson recognizes that nanotechnology is not as mainstream as the integrated circuit industry but hopes that the region can take the lead in an emerging technology with huge potential. “We are taking the risk in assuming that the technology will mature and generate the types of economic benefits that a lot of futurologists are identifying. The danger is that if we don’t engage in this technology someone else will and the products will make our industries redundant.”

Advantage West Midlands also hopes that the I2 Nanotech Centre will put the region firmly on the map when it bids this spring alongside Birmingham University and QinetiQ to host the National Microsystems Technology Centre.

“We hope to have a portfolio of facilities ranging from microsystems to molecular level nanotechnology that will support new product innovations for the region’s economy well into the 21st century,” Thompson said.

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By Tom Henderson
Small Times Senior Writer

ANN ARBOR, Mich., Dec. 20, 2001 — A group of angel investors has kicked in $100,000 and hopes to use its business savvy to help transform a struggling maker of nanopowders from “a science project” into a viable commercial enterprise.

The firm, TAL Materials Inc., makes relatively high volumes of powders from metal oxides, including rare earths.

The angels also brought to the table a backer from the bulk-metals industry who will fund

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TAL Materials Marketing Director Walt Garff,
left, and angel investor Steve Swanson stand in
front of TAL’s furnace for processing nanopowders.
testing of phosphorescent powders that company officials hope can be mixed into molten metals and later used to identify finished products as genuine. Counterfeit parts, they say, are rampant in the airline and auto aftermarkets.

“I’m here as an angel investor,” said Steve Swanson, part of a group that includes Peter Gray of Ann Arbor and Edward Lapekas of Chicago, former chairman and chief executive officer of American National Can Group Inc.

Swanson was named interim chief executive of TAL this month. He owned Swanson Capital Management, a money-management company for high net-worth individuals in Ann Arbor, for 24 years before selling it in 1997 to co-found Arbor Partners LLC, a venture-capital firm.

Swanson and Gray are principals in Arbor Partners, but Swanson said this was not an Arbor Partners deal. “If we see higher revenues later, we can take it to our company for funding. This is very early-stage equity money,” said Swanson, who said the angel group has pledged another $400,000 in increments as TAL hits certain goals.

TAL, which has three full-time and four part-time employees, was founded in 1996 out of research at the University of Michigan (U-M) by Richard Laine, a professor of materials science and engineering. TAL’s process for making mixed-metal-oxide nanopowders involves flame-spray pyrolysis, a rapid quenching of heated metal powders.

“The soot from the combustion is our nanopowder,” Laine said.

TAL claims to be able to make up to 5 kilograms an hour of nanopowders in its new, larger reactor. Until now, officials said, it has survived on federal Small Business Innovative Research (SBIR) grants and providing small quantities of powders for the R&D efforts of Fortune 500 companies, which they say they are prohibited from naming because of nondisclosure agreements.

OraSure Technologies Inc., a publicly traded medical diagnostics firm based in Bethlehem, Pa., has been a steady customer for TAL’s fluorescing nanopowders

OraSure’s chief science officer, Sam Niedbala, said his firm uses the powders in point-of-service diagnostic tests at medical facilities, and is about to use them in Europe in kits that test for illicit drugs and alcohol use at random traffic stops.

Niedbala said TAL is able to supply nanopowders in far greater volumes than its competitors. “Lots of people can produce very small quantities, but TAL is able to supply us with kilogram quantities, and even grams produced enough for millions of tests,” said Niedbala.

Swanson acknowledged that the current hype about all things nano is reminiscent of the hype that accompanied the dot-com era, an era he understands well since Arbor Partners invested in a wide range of e-commerce companies.

“Nano has become a buzzword, too, but there’s a difference. The dot-coms had high revenues and no profits. With nano, you can have much lower revenues and make a profit. You can have a very nice business.”

Swanson said that as interim CEO he will identify market opportunities, focus the company’s technology and help turn it from a research and development firm into a commercial maker and seller of products. Once he gets the company in the black, “we’re going to run a tight ship; in the not too distant future we want to be at the break-even point.” He also wants to hire a permanent CEO.

“The quicker we’re successful, the quicker I’m out of here. We’ve just taken off our training wheels. We don’t need a CEO at this point. I’m not getting paid, and you don’t get too many CEOs at that price,” he joked.

“A lot of university technologies are science projects looking for commercialization. This is a science project looking for commercialization that we think makes sense,” he said. He said potential applications include ceramic oxides for medical implants, metal oxides for fuel cells, pigments for the printing industry, coatings for specialty glass, phosphorescent powders to help fight counterfeit airplane and auto parts, and photonics materials.

A paper on photonic aspects of TAL’s powders, titled “Laser Action in Strongly Scattering Rare-Earth-Doped Dielectric Nanophosphors,” was accepted on Aug. 15 for an upcoming issue of the prestigious physics journal Physical Review A.

Swanson and Gray decided to invest after seeing a presentation by TAL’s Artem Doubov, a recent graduate of U-M’s MBA program and a former second lieutenant in the Russian army.

They in turn brought in Ann Arbor businessman Gerald Berger to fund a crucial proof of concept involving phosphorescent nanopowders and the fight against parts counterfeiting.

Berger is president of North American Minerals Corp., a supplier of minerals and alloys to the steel and aluminum industries. TAL has shown it can embed bar codes made up of metal oxides on the surface of metal products. Based on an alloy of terbium, aluminum and garnet, the powders give off visible red light when hit with an infrared laser light source.

In theory, the same technology could be used to scatter small amounts of powder into molten aluminum. As the aluminum hardened into ingots and later was made into parts, trace amounts of the metal oxides would end up on the surface. Hit with an infrared light source, they would emit red light.

By varying the quantities of the various metals, TAL thinks it can subtly change the color of the light emitted to allow manufacturers to tell when a particular metal was made and in what plant.

The result, said Berger, would help fight two big problems — counterfeit ingots that, for example, are stamped “Alcoa” but are actually made of inferior alloys made offshore; and counterfeit parts in the auto and airplane industries.

“I’ve already had interest from two aluminum companies and one steel company,” said Berger. “There’s nothing finer than to offer to put two ingots on a table and say, `We can tell you which one is ours. Shine a laser on it and it says Ann Arbor.’

“This is an enormous market,” Berger said. “The U.S. market is around 30 million tons of aluminum a year, at $2,000 a ton. What’s that? $60 billion a year? And the thing with nano is, a little pinch goes a long way. It’s not a tremendous additive to cost.

“It’s a fascinating venture. We’ll see if we can prove the principle out over the next several months. TAL’s got a shelf full of metals and rare earths. You can mix and match those nanopowders to give 100,000 different readings. You get a unique tag for each mixture. We want it to shine 100,000 different ways.”

“We’re at the very formative early stages of a process that we hope validates us,” Swanson said. “We’ll know a lot more in three months. This will get us from the science stage to the commercial stage IF we can prove out that we have something here.”

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CONTACT THE AUTHOR:
Tom Henderson at [email protected] or call 734-528-6292.

Chris Anderson

MINNEAPOLIS—Donaldson Co. Inc., a leader in filtration systems serving a variety of industries including the cleanroom market, announced in September the first airborne contaminant and noise filtration systems developed especially for use with fuel cells. The products are the first for the company's year-old Fuel Cell Contamination Control (FC3) business unit.

“Intake-air—or cathode-side—filtration is a crucial component for ensuring fuel cell reliability and performance, but it's just now being included as a core subsystem,” says Eivind Stenersen, chief engineer of the Donaldson FC3 business unit. “Ambient air in all corners of the world contains contaminants that can compromise the fuel cell system durability, life and performance. To make the leap from the lab to the marketplace, fuel cells will require particle and chemical filtration of the cathode air.”

The operation of a fuel cell involves no combustion. Rather it relies on converting the chemical energy of hydrogen into DC power while leaving only heat and water as byproducts of the energy conversion. It is anticipated that fuel cells of varying sizes will power everything from cell phones to busses. According to Donaldson, the company is uniquely positioned to take advantage of the market as it looks to leverage its existing filtration and acoustic damping technology on an as yet undefined market.

“Fuels cells aren't available for commercial use, though they will be sometime in the next 12 to 18 months,” says Ric Canepa, director of the FC3 business unit. Still, Donaldson is committed to being there when the market opens and has been working with researchers around the world in the development of fuel cell filters. The FC3 unit currently has overseas offices in Brussels, Belgium and Osaka, Japan.

Domestically, Donaldson has collaborated with fuel cell researchers from the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico to refine its filters for this specific use. Canepa says Donaldson's relationship with Los Alamos goes back more than 30 years developing filters and noise dampening products for internal combustion engines for military vehicles.

“At first, many thought you could use the same kind of filters used on engines to provide the necessary level of filtration for fuel cells,” Canepa says. “But fuel cells are very sensitive and require filtration for sub-micrometer particles and a variety of gases found in trace amounts in the atmosphere. Our filters allow for more efficient operation and longevity of fuel cells, which will make them a cost-effective power source for many different applications.”

U.S. Patent number: 6,294,858

Date: Sept. 25, 2001

Assignee(s):
    Sandia Corporation (Albuquerque, NM)

Inventor(s):
    King; Donald B. (Albuquerque, NM);
    Sadwick; Laurence P. (Salt Lake City, UT);
    Wernsman; Bernard R. (Clairton, PA)
   

Abstract:
Microminiature thermionic converts (MTCs) having high energy-conversion efficiencies and variable operating temperatures. Methods of manufacturing those converters using semiconductor integrated circuit fabrication and micromachine manufacturing techniques are also disclosed. The MTCs of the invention incorporate cathode to anode spacing of about 1 micron or less and use cathode and anode materials having work functions ranging from about 1 eV to about 3 eV. Existing prior art thermionic converter technology has energy conversion efficiencies ranging from 5-15%. The MTCs of the present invention have maximum efficiencies of just under 30%, and thousands of the devices can be fabricated at modest costs.

Click here to read full patent information

By John Carroll
Small Times Correspondent

DALLAS, Aug. 29, 2001 — Alan MacDiarmid has always based his research on a simple premise: “Science is people.”

“You can have the most beautiful institute in the world, but if you don’t have first-class people you’re going to do lousy research,” said the Nobel Prize-winning scientist.

Now, MacDiarmid is bringing this precept to the fledgling NanoTech Institute at the University of Texas at Dallas (UTD), where he recently signed on to work as chairman of the institute’s advisory committee.

It’s anything but an honorary role. In a lengthy interview with Small Times, MacDiarmid laid out ambitious plans to devote 125 days a year to his UTD tasks, beginning this fall with the institute’s inaugural semester. He’ll combine his supervision of a group of six nanotechnology researchers in the laboratory with a whirl of meetings aimed at bringing to Dallas the best and brightest nanotech scientists from around the world.

MacDiarmid will be a key visionary in mapping out the institute’s path to some ambitious goals, said Ray Baughman, the institute’s newly appointed director.

“Alan is a person who is unique, and not just because of his truly outstanding scientific capabilities but because of his relationships around the world,” said Baughman as he was packing up to move from New Jersey to Dallas and his new job.

Baughman has already recruited an international crew of nanotech researchers from Spain, Korea and Russia. Baughman will need all the connections he can get. The scientist wants to see a host of commercial spin-offs from the results of the institute’s research and has set his sights on helping to spawn a Nanotech Corridor alongside the huge Telecom Corridor that has grown up near the university’s Richardson, Texas, campus.

Initially, said Baughman, the institute will focus much of its work on carbon nanotubes for energy storage and photonic nanocrystals in semiconductors. Later, he added, researchers will move into various other areas of nanotechnology, with an emphasis on the potential it has to spawn new biotech products.

Baughman said he’s anxious to team up with private companies in the region like Zyvex, which is exploring the commercial potential of molecular manufacturing in a Richardson office park.

Zyvex has been a keen backer of UTD’s NanoTech Institute. Company founder James Von Ehr pledged $2.5 million toward the university’s nanotechnology efforts. And Von Ehr said that there’s already been a significant amount of interaction between the university’s scientists and his staff researchers.

Gaining a Nobel laureate “really puts UTD out there in a pretty good position,” said Von Ehr. Further collaborations are planned as Von Ehr brings some of the university’s top students in to work with Zyvex’s equipment and participate in joint research projects.

“The fact is that we have some excellent equipment in the lab, including things that UTD doesn’t have,” Von Ehr said.

A string of nanotech companies and university research arms scattered throughout Texas has already made the Lone Star State a hotbed of nanotech activity. Von Ehr helped bring 14 universities and businesses together to form the Texas Nanotechnology Initiative, and UTD won $500,000 from the state legislature last May to help launch its new institute.

Much of the institute’s success, said MacDiarmid, will depend on the intellectual sparks that fly whenever leading scientists come together.

“So frequently the key advances are made outside the meeting room” as scientists sit down for a beer or over lunch to discuss their work, MacDiarmid said. By bringing together the best minds from various disciplines, he said, UTD can become a leader in initiating new advances in nanotechnology.

“The future big advances are going to be in the area of interdisciplines,” said MacDiarmid, who will also continue as Blanchard Professor of Chemistry at the University of Pennsylvania. Under a unique agreement with UTD he’ll rotate his researchers between both campuses, traveling to Texas intermittently while he coordinates his research work in both states.

MacDiarmid has considerable experience in interdisciplinary research. He won the Nobel Prize in chemistry last year for work that started more than a quarter-century ago. In the early ’70s, he focused his attention on organic conducting polymers, working with Hideki Shirakawa at the Tokyo Institute of Technology, who introduced him to a new form of polyacetylene.

They were joined by Alan Heeger at the University of Pennsylvania’s department of physics in groundbreaking interdisciplinary research that led to the discovery of conducting polymers — commonly referred to today as synthetic metals.

By working together, said MacDiarmid, they were able to discover that organic polymers could be “doped” and turned into a conducting material similar to metals. One way of doping polymers, they found, was to introduce a chemical compound that reduced the number of electrons packed inside the plastic. That allowed the material to conduct electricity.

Other researchers were quick to see the possibilities and have been building on the trio’s work to use the conducting polymers in rechargeable batteries, stealth applications, corrosion inhibition and “plastic” transistors and electrodes.

“Interdisciplinary research is tougher than carrying out regular research in one field,” MacDiarmid said. “One of the keys in interdisciplinary research is to learn the language of a different field, and that takes time.”

But in nanoscience, he added, the extra effort has to be made, particularly as no one person is able to keep up with all of the literature and advances being made daily.

MacDiarmid will initially direct his research group to look for unexpected reactions involving nanomaterials. But don’t expect him to outline exactly what he wants.

“I don’t know what I’m looking for,” MacDiarmid said.

In pioneering research, scientists journey into the unknown. When researchers traveled into space, MacDiarmid said, they found unexpected phenomena, just as they did when they examined life forms at the bottom of the sea under incredible pressures.

MacDiarmid’s research group will build on his experience involving conducting polymers. “In my opinion, it’s not unreasonable to believe that in the next few years we’ll see true nanoelectronics.”

Nanoelectronics, for example, can be key to developing new biomedical systems that require very tiny devices that can be inserted into a body — including sensors that can travel in the bloodstream. “We need nanoelectronics to power them,” said MacDiarmid, who’s been experimenting recently with “electronic transportation of living microorganisms through air.”

Mixing water and yeast together to initiate reproduction, MacDiarmid charges the mix to 25,000 volts. Setting up a negative electrode a foot away, he found he could attract yeast particles through the air. These kinds of experiments, he says, may help lead researchers to better understand how to power and direct tiny biomedical devices in the human body.

Still, he has no long-term goals for where nanotechnology research is headed. There are too many unexpected twists and turns ahead.

“If five years from now we are doing what we are planning to do now,” MacDiarmid said, “then something is wrong.”

Related Story: NanoTexas: Land of Big Oil is now boomtown for tiny

ECD Growth Prompts Move


August 21, 2001

August 21, 2001 — TROY, MI — Energy Conversion Devices, Inc.Technology and materials developer is moving to a new facility that will house the company’s new, state-of-the art ISO Class 7 (Class 10,000) and ISO Class 6 (Class 1,000) cleanroom space.

The new 50,000 square foot facility is located in Rochester Hills, Michigan, about nine miles from the current facility in Troy. In addition to cleanroom space, the facility will also house corporate offices including financial, accounting, legal, patent, purchasing, marketing, shareholder relations and human resource departments.

According to officials, the move was fueled by increased business for the hydrogen economy business.

“The enthusiastic acceptance of ECD’s commercial photovoltaic, battery and hydrogen storage products has translated into increased business in all of our energy area,” said CEO Stan Ovshinsky. “The move to our new headquarters and the large-scale expansion of our production facilities allows us to respond to these critical needs and to offer additional support to our joint ventures and manufacturing units.”

The move is expected to be complete by September.

NANOTECH CENTER NAMED FOR EX-TAIWAN LEADER

Lee Teng-hui, former president of Taiwan and Cornell University alumnus, came back to campus this week for the groundbreaking of a nanotechnology center named after him.

The Lee Teng-hui Institute for Scientific Research will be part of a new $60 million high-tech research center. Completion is set for 2003.

Lee, who earned his Ph.D. in 1968 in agricultural economics from Cornell, gave a speech Thursday hailing the advent of what he dubbed “the nano age,” and its potential for solving problems such as pollution, natural resources depletion and food and energy shortages.

CHINA HOSTS NANOTECH CONFERENCE

The latest nanotechnology developments are expected to be discussed next week at the International Symposium on Nanomaterials and Technology in China, according to AsiaPort Daily News, an international wire service.

Topics at the conference, which is scheduled to be held July 2-5 at the Beijing International Conference Center, include nanotechnology applications in information materials, medicine, metal, energy and the environment, the report said. Related story: China opens new nanotech center

NANOGRAM CREATES NEW POSITION

A corporate attorney and consultant will be NanoGram Corp.’s first vice president of strategic and subsidiary development.

The Fremont, Calif.-based nanomaterial company hired Jason M. Lemkin, who will be responsible for global initiatives supporting nanomaterial applications and intellectual property.

Lemkin has held executive posts at Pathway Ventures, a venture-focused consulting firm, BabyCenter, now part of Johnson & Johnson, and Venture Law Group, providing counsel to technology firms.

NanoGram has developed technology for making nanomaterials for optical, electronic and energy storage.

OPTICAL NETWORKING’S FUTURE IS ‘DENSE’

Prospects look good for the optical networking market despite layoffs, lower earnings forecasts and excess capacity, according to the findings of a market-research firm reported on the Internet.com news site.

Cahners In-Stat Group said its optimism lies in dense wavelength-division multiplexing (DWDM), a fiber-optic transmission technique that employs light wavelengths to transmit data. The technique increases both the quantity and quality of data, and easily fits into existing network equipment.

During 1999 and 2000, carriers installed a huge amount of fiber, leaving them with a large inventory. In-Stat said it expects installation to slow, creating opportunities for DWDM system manufacturers as their products allow carriers to increase capacity by lighting unused fiber rather than laying new fiber.

MORE MEMS GOAL OF NEW SLM CHIEF

Developing cutting-edge MEMS technology is the goal of the new chief executive officer of Silicon Light Machines (SLM), a subsidiary of San Jose, Calif.-based Cypress Semiconductor.

SLM on Tuesday announced the hiring of Tom Werner, whose background includes management posts at General Electric, Corning Inc. U.S. Robotics and 3Com, a Silicon news release said.

SLM said Werner will work to strengthen the company’s MEMS-based Grating Light Valve (GLV) technology in communications markets and expand product offerings.

Sony uses the GLV chip for imaging systems, such as home television and large projections for digital cinema.

MECHANICAL TECHNOLOGY HIRES MEMS CHIEF

Mechanical Technology Inc. announced Tuesday that it has hired a director of MEMS and component engineering, according to a company statement.

Juan Becerra will work on the Albany, N.Y.-based company’s recently launched micro fuel-cell initiative, which focuses on developing direct methanol micro fuel cells, the company said.

Becerra has worked at Xerox Corp. and Digital Equipment Corp.

— Compiled by Jeff Karoub

NANOGRAM CREATES NEW POSITION

A corporate attorney and consultant will be NanoGram Corp.’s first vice president of strategic and subsidiary development.

The Fremont, Calif.-based nanomaterial company hired Jason M. Lemkin, who will be responsible for global initiatives supporting nanomaterial applications and intellectual property.

Lemkin has held executive posts at Pathway Ventures, a venture-focused consulting firm, BabyCenter, now part of Johnson & Johnson, and Venture Law Group, providing counsel to technology firms.

NanoGram has developed technology for making nanomaterials for optical, electronic and energy storage.

OPTICAL NETWORKING’S FUTURE IS ‘DENSE’

Prospects look good for the optical networking market despite layoffs, lower earnings forecasts and excess capacity, according to the findings of a market-research firm reported on the Internet.com news site.

Cahners In-Stat Group said its optimism lies in dense wavelength-division multiplexing (DWDM), a fiber-optic transmission technique that employs light wavelengths to transmit data. The technique increases both the quantity and quality of data, and easily fits into existing network equipment.

During 1999 and 2000, carriers installed a huge amount of fiber, leaving them with a large inventory. In-Stat said it expects installation to slow, creating opportunities for DWDM system manufacturers as their products allow carriers to increase capacity by lighting unused fiber rather than laying new fiber.

MORE MEMS GOAL OF NEW SLM CHIEF

Developing cutting-edge MEMS technology is the goal of the new chief executive officer of Silicon Light Machines (SLM), a subsidiary of San Jose, Calif.-based Cypress Semiconductor.

SLM on Tuesday announced the hiring of Tom Werner, whose background includes management posts at General Electric, Corning Inc. U.S. Robotics and 3Com, a Silicon news release said.

SLM said Werner will work to strengthen the company’s MEMS-based Grating Light Valve (GLV) technology in communications markets and expand product offerings.

Sony uses the GLV chip for imaging systems, such as home television and large projections for digital cinema.

MECHANICAL TECHNOLOGY HIRES MEMS CHIEF

Mechanical Technology Inc. announced Tuesday that it has hired a director of MEMS and component engineering, according to a company statement.

Juan Becerra will work on the Albany, N.Y.-based company’s recently launched micro fuel-cell initiative, which focuses on developing direct methanol micro fuel cells, the company said.

Becerra has worked at Xerox Corp. and Digital Equipment Corp.

— Compiled by Jeff Karoub

By Jeff Karoub
Small Times Staff Writer

June 21, 2001 — University of South Carolina researchers hope their work will one day lead to improved fuel cells and higher-octane fuels that use energy more efficiently.

The engine for those new discoveries will be USC’s soon-to-be built NanoCenter. The center will be used to study nanoscience – building structures molecule by molecule.

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Andrea M. Perez Turner conducts research
at the Cornell Nanofabrication Facility,
where scientists are working on creating
a chip that would help grow cells in
brain-damaged patients. CNF photo
USC joins a list of at least 15 such university-level nanotechnology centers in the United States, and that number is growing, said Brian Valentine, program manager for the U.S. Department of Energy’s office of industrial technologies. Valentine said the number is close to 100 if you include institutions with nanotechnology programs.

For researchers, it’s about being pioneers in an area that is expected to influence medicine, science and the environment. But for the universities, it’s also about tapping into the public dollars that can help start and operate such programs. Valentine’s office is part of the National Nanotechnology Initiative, which spreads its $400 million budget to several federal agencies that provide money for research and development efforts in the field.

“It’s a frontier science area,” said Rick Adams, who began last week as director of USC’s center and has been a researcher and professor at the university since 1984.

The South Carolina legislature set aside $1 million in seed money and university officials are expecting to get $1 million more to help renovate an old engineering college during the next year. NanoCenter officials have not released final costs of the overall project.

“The university is trying to keep up to date on research, technology and … leading areas for development in the near future,” he said. “We have to get to it.”

Much of the research at these nanolabs is a long way from commercial application, university and government officials said. But ideas like a “lab on a chip,” which can be used to test new drugs on human cells, could be available within the next several years.

University-based research centers receive most of their money from the public sector, he said, but private corporations and venture capitalists are becoming interested, as nanotechnology products get primed for the marketplace.

Two of Japan’s largest firms said Tuesday they planned to invest hundreds of millions in nanotechnology research, according to the Reuters news agency.

Mitsubishi Corp. said it would set up a $100 million venture capital fund in August, with $10 million of that going to nanotech companies specializing in information devices and medical technology, the report said. Mitsui & Co. Ltd. also said it would invest $80 million during the next five years in mass production of miniature products.

Although it’s not common, there are instances where business, government and academia join forces in nanotechnology research and development.

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute’s new Nanotechnology Center in Troy, N.Y., receives annual grants of $1 million from the federal government, $500,000 from the institute itself and $1 million total from such businesses as Eastman Kodak, IBM and Philip Morris Companies Inc.

“I spent a good part of the last year-and-a-half raising those funds,” said Richard W. Siegel, the center’s director. “It’s been fantastic – I had much more success than I ever imagined.”

Siegel said his background has helped him forge bonds with industry. Before coming to Rensselaer six years ago, he worked 21 years as a researcher at Argonne National Laboratories in suburban Chicago. In 1989, he formed Nanophase Technology Corp., which since has become a leader in making industrial quantities of nanoscale materials.

He said his work at Rensselaer, which deals with designing and creating polymer-based nanoscale composites, is not production-oriented, but it will help solve long-term problems for industries.

Valentine said businesses benefit from such partnerships because they often lead to exclusive licenses or other lucrative deals down the road.

Corporations like Eastman Kodak and DuPont are trying to speed up the process by working alongside students at the Cornell Nanofabrication Facility. Firms are charged an hourly rate to use the laboratories, but the findings remain the property of the companies, according to Melanie-Claire Mallison, the facility’s spokeswoman.

In addition to the lab on a chip, the Cornell researchers are working on creating a chip that would help grow cells in brain-damaged patients. Pillars placed on each chip would act as a bridge for neurons to cross over dead brain cells and create new synapses in an effort to regain lost function.

Both projects are several years from commercial applications, Mallison said.

“It’s just incredibly busy here,” she said. “The clean room is constantly packed with users. We have new project requests every day, but it’s sort of a happy problem.”

The gridlock is expected to ease as a result of next week’s groundbreaking of a $60 million high-tech research center that will include the Nanofabrication Facility. Completion is set for 2003.

Governments, states in particular, get involved to meet a broader objective: economic development.

Michigan aims to put itself on the MEMS and microsystems map with its Life Sciences Corridor Initiative, a billion-dollar effort designed to link activity at state research institutions and businesses. Most of that goes either to universities alone or in collaboration with private research facilities.

“Universities are one of the leading places in the state where research and development are taking place,” said Jeff Mason, senior vice president of public affairs for the Michigan Economic Development Corp.

“To have the ability to spin technology out of the university level into the private sector and keep it in this state is critical. We want to keep the brainpower that is being developed at our educational institutions.”

The Nanotechnology Database, a list of leading research centers in the field sponsored by the National Science Foundation, is available at http://itri.loyola.edu/nano/links.htm.

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CONTACT THE AUTHOR:
Jeff Karoub at [email protected] or call 734-994-1106.