Tag: manufacturing
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Glare-Free Water-Resistant Nanotech Glass Developed
Engineers at Massachusetts Institute of Technology have developed a new type of glass that eliminates almost all reflection and causes water to bounce off. The team of MIT graduate students, faculty, and former postdoc — now at North Carolina State University — published their findings earlier this month in the journal ACS Nano (paid subscription…
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Forest Biofuels Unsustainable, Could Boost Greenhouse Gases
An analysis by researchers in Europe and the U.S. indicate that large-scale biofuel production from forest biomass is unsustainable and will increase greenhouse gas emissions. The findings appear online in the journal Global Change Biology/Bioenergy. The report, an invited analysis by the journal, was led by the Max-Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry in Germany, Oregon State…
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Bioengineered Microbe Developed for Low-Temperature Enzymes
Molecular biologists at University of Georgia in Athens have devised a process for engineering a microorganism to generate enzymes at lower temperatures than in its natural state. Their findings appear today in the online journal mBio published by American Society for Microbiology. The team, led by Georgia professor Michael Adams, engineered a type of microbe…
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BASF to Boost R&D Spending, Staffing
The global chemical company BASF in Ludwigshafen, Germany says it plans to increase its research and development spending to €1.7 billion ($2.3 billion) in 2012, and align its R&D programs more closely with high-growth business fields. The company also announced plans to increase its research staff, particularly in Asia and the Americas. The €1.7 billion…
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Nissan, College Establish U.K. Electric Vehicle R&D Center
Nissan Motors and Gateshead College have unveiled plans for an academic center for research on electric vehicle technologies on the college’s campus in northeast England. Nissan is the maker of the plug-in electric Leaf to be produced at a plant in nearby Sunderland. The Zero Emission Centre of Excellence (ZECE), as the joint project is…
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Virginia Tech to Establish Auto Tire Research Center
Virginia Tech in Blacksburg is setting up a new research center devoted to the study of vehicle tires. The Center for Tire Research, which will involve collaborations with other institutions and tire and auto companies, gets its initial funding from a National Science Foundation (NSF) grant. The tire research center is expected to focus on…
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Study Shows Increased Heat Boosts Biochar as Soil Additive
A research team at Rice University in Houston, Texas has found that heating biochar — charcoal added to topsoil to enhance plant growth — to 450 degrees Celsius increases its ability to deliver water and nutrients to the targeted crops. Their findings appear online this week in the journal Biomass and Bioenergy (paid subscription required).…
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Unilever Launches Open Innovation Initiative
The consumer goods manufacturer Unilever unveiled today its open innovation program seeking ideas for new products and technologies from the public at large. The initiative is managed by the online intellectual property marketplace yet2.com. Unilever’s program is structured around a set of issues or problems for which it seeks collaborators to find solutions. The opening…
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Pennsylvania Awards Five University Commercialization Grants
Pennsylvania’s Department of Community and Economic Development approved $3.15 million for five grants to support research and development in nanotechnology and advanced materials. The grants were made through the Ben Franklin Technology Development Authority’s University Research Commercialization Program that aims to build stronger synergies between university-based research and technology transfer. The Ben Franklin Technology Partners…
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Bridgestone Tire to Study Natural Raw Rubber Alternative
Bridgestone Corporation, a global tire manufacturer in Tokyo, Japan unveiled plans today for a research project in the U.S. to develop a new commercially viable, renewable source of tire-quality natural rubber. The project aims to harness the cultivation of guayule — pronounced why-YOU-lee — as an alternative to hevea trees, the current source of almost…