Mechanical Technology October 2015

⎪ Innovative engineering ⎪

with voids and what happens with these materials.” One application that Chawla and his colleagues have developed shows promise as a means to clean water that’s been polluted by industrial textile dyes, oil spills, antibiotics or other pharma- ceuticals. “We take tiny microspheres of glass and coat them with titanium diox- ide,” says Chawla. Under the action of ultraviolet rays, titanium dioxide breaks up pollutants into harmless by-products. Putting the titanium dioxide around the outside hollow spheres is novel. When introduced into water it becomes foam that floats on the water surface. It’s very benign.” Another significant application of the work is its potential to curb global warm- ing caused by methane gas. “Methane is starting to enter the atmosphere at higher rates because of melting of natural deposits of methane hydrate from global warming, agriculture and landfills,” Gladysz says. “It all just goes into the atmosphere. The one path we can take is to capture methane in a stable solid cage and then use it as a fuel to serve as a bridge to renewable energy. This meth-

ane hydrate structure consists of a single molecule of methane inside an ice cage, so there is a void at that scale in the cage. By studying the structure and void spaces in methane hydrate; we can create organic molecules with larger void spaces that can hold more meth- ane. Potentially we can capture this methane and put it in a more thermally stable solid.” Gladysz says the implications are impressive. “As in the methane hydrate example, we look to nature for solutions and we then try to improve on them.” Microspheres from Trelleborg Trelleborg’s Eccospheres ® are thin-walled, hollow glass microspheres (HGMS) devel- oped to meet the demanding strength, weight and electrical specifications of companies in the aerospace, defence and industrial markets. Magnification reveals the near perfect spherical shape of HGMS, which to the naked eye resemble a fine, white, free-flowing powder. The unique properties of Eccospheres can help reduce costs, enhance products

Trelleborg’s Eccospheres ® are thin-walled, hollow glass microspheres (HGMS) developed to meet the demanding strength, weight and electrical specifications of companies in the aerospace, defence and industrial markets.

and improve material processing. Ec- cospheres can be incorporated into a wide range of polymer and resin systems and can replace or combine with other materials to create composites. Areas of applications are extreme processing conditions (extrusion, roller milling, and injection moulding), chemically sensitive systems (silicones, vinyl esters, long pot- life epoxies), high viscosity systems, high temperature systems and low dielectric/ loss tangent materials. q

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