Latest Zeolites Stories

DM Crumbliss for RedOrbit.com A study has identified new minerals that could cut the costs of removing carbon dioxide from emissions at power plants. The research was done by scientists at Rice University, the University of California, Berkeley, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) and the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) was published online this week in the journal Nature Materials. Fossil fuel power plants are responsible for about half the CO2 emissions added to the...

SYOSSET, N.Y., May 18, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Mr. Wallace McGregor of Spokane, Washington, has been included in the Strathmore's Who's Who Worldwide Edition for his outstanding contributions and achievements in the mining industry. ABOUT WALLACE MCGREGOR Mr. McGregor has 60 years experience in mining. He graduated from the Colorado School of Mines with a Geological Engineering Degree in 1952 and an MBA from the Harvard Business School in 1958. He undertook independent mineral...

Berkeley Researchers Develop Tools for Identifying Effective Carbon Capture Technologies Approximately 75 percent of electricity used in the United States is produced by coal-burning power plants that spew carbon dioxide (CO2) into the atmosphere and contribute to global warming. To reduce this effect, many researchers are searching for porous materials to filter out the CO2 generated by these plants before it reaches the atmosphere, a process commonly known as carbon capture. But...

Filtering carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas, from factory smokestacks is a necessary, but expensive part of many manufacturing processes. However, a collaborative research team from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the University of Delaware has gathered new insight into the performance of a material called a zeolite that may stop carbon dioxide in its tracks far more efficiently than current scrubbers do. Zeolites are highly porous rocks—think of a sponge...

Possible applications in chemistry and industry Zeolites are porous materials with perfectly regular pores and high surface area that can act as molecular sieves. This property has led to important applications including the purification of air or water such as the contaminated seawater around Fukushima. Zeolites are used as catalysts – all gasoline is now made with zeolites – and for the separation and adsorption of numerous substances. While more than 200 zeolites are known today,...

Researchers studying how fluids travel through nanoscale channels were surprised to discover that the fluids don't flow equally well in all directions. Contrary to the behavior in the macroscale world, the researchers discovered that methyl alcohol, when it was placed in a network of nanoscale channels in a mineral known as a zeolite, diffused 1,000 times faster in one direction than another. This is the first known evidence of such highly unequal diffusion of molecules in a nanoporous...

Breakthrough culminates a decade’s worth of research A University of Minnesota team of researchers has overcome a major hurdle in the quest to design a specialized type of molecular sieve that could make the production of gasoline, plastics and various chemicals more cost effective and energy efficient. The breakthrough research, led by chemical engineering and materials science professor Michael Tsapatsis in the university's College of Science and Engineering, is published in the most...

Rice University team creates database of 2.6 million varieties of molecular sievesSome people collect stamps and coins, but when it comes to sheer utility, few collections rival the usefulness of Rice University researcher Michael Deem's collection of 2.6 million zeolite structures.Zeolites are materials -- including some natural minerals -- that act as molecular sieves, thanks to a Swiss-cheese-like arrangement of pores that can sort, filter, trap and chemically process everything from drugs...

One of the sources of emission for pollutants in living spaces are particleboards glued with adhesives that contain formaldehyde. There is a new method that will now provide another way to reduce these vapors. The trick can be found in special minerals that equip wood materials with properties for cleaning air in living spaces.Since the 50s, formaldehyde has been the basic material for many artificial resins and glues used in particleboards and plywood boards. Estimates indicate that more...

With the passage of a molecule through the labyrinth of a chemical system being so critical to catalysis and other important chemical processes, computer simulations are frequently used to model potential molecule/labyrinth interactions. In the past, such simulations have been expensive and time-consuming to carry out, but now researchers with the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) have developed a new algorithm that should make future simulations easier and faster to...