Innovation Pipeline

When listing nature’s wonders, you’d have to put spiderwebs somewhere near the top. Strands of biomaterial with the tensile strength of steel formed into complex shapes that withstand wind, heat and sunlight. They’re so impressive that scientists still don’t entirely understand them.
But recently researchers at the University of Wyoming have deciphered the glue that cements [...]

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A group of researchers at Carnegie Mellon University are working on a new type of sodium-ion battery that could prove to be a practical option for storing power from wind and solar farms, says Jay Whitacre, a professor of materials science and engineering at Carnegie Mellon. Whitacre’s startup, 44 Tech, based in Pittsburgh, will receive [...]

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The efficiency and elegance of materials occurring in nature have always been an inspiration to researchers. Trying to achieve similar results via nanoengineering, scientists are now working on nanoscale particles that automatically orient themselves into unique materials with powerful properties.
It makes sense, this self-assembly approach, because it’s simply too difficult to manipulate nanoparticles with lab [...]

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No doubt, cleantech companies were upbeat when the White House stimulus package allocated 13 percent of the total $104 billion stimulus package for green technology. Much of the economic stimulus will flow to cleantech infrastructure, but exactly where will it go?
Cleantech sectors, which were big winners, include smart grid technology with $4.5 billion, energy efficiency [...]

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OK. It’s New Zealand, not Australia. But this company called EcoInnovation still reminds you a little bit of Road Warrior. Founder and chief engineer Michael Lawley has built his “renewable energy store” on the ingenious redeployment of everyday household appliances.
Among other things, the company recycles SmartDrive motors from salvaged washing machines to generate hydropower. Of [...]

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The planet’s oceans hold tremendous reserves of natural resources. Among those is one not-so-obvious asset: cold water. It has the potential to help cool buildings onshore in a system called seawater conditioning.
Development is moving ahead in Honolulu and San Diego. In Hawaii, a large seawater conditioning program received a $10.75 million investment by Honolulu Seawater [...]

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Oil and water do mix — all too often. And they’re not so easy to separate. Just ask the research scientists trying to develop next-generation water-filtration technologies to do it.
But with the 21st century toolsets of nanotech and chemistry, they promise to overcome vexing problems of cost-effectively removing oil agents from drinking water.
Researchers at Purdue [...]

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One big problem of converting to solar generated electricity is what to do when the sun goes down. To ensure electrical current on the grid doesn’t sharply fall off, requires an industrial-scale electrical storage system to smooth out short term fluctuations. It’s a problem at the heart of realizing a renewable energy economy.
There’s an [...]

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