titanium dioxide Archives – The Green Optimistic

Common White Food Additive Highly Disturbing to Our Guts

Ece Polat — Thu, 23 Feb 2017 14:58:30 +0000

Binghamton University found that when nanoparticles of titanium dioxide were exposed to the small intestine cells, the cells’ ability to absorb nutrients and block pathogens were drastically decreased. The founding holds importance on daily life, as the substance can be found in from gum to bread. The exposure lasted over four hours, and the amount […]

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Solar Powered Coating Developed for Self-Cleaning Surfaces

Maria Reyes — Wed, 18 Jul 2012 17:58:37 +0000

Today’s technology is not just about smart gadgets, but also about smart materials that possess self-cleaning capabilities as well. Talking about progress, even cleaning is becoming more time and energy-efficient. Scientists belonging to the Fraunhofer Photocatalysis Alliance, which is composed of ten Fraunhofer Institutes, are conducting research on titanium dioxide. Titanium dioxide is a photocatalyst; […]

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Grätzel's New Dye-Sensitized Solar Cells: Cheaper and More Efficient

Ovidiu Sandru — Wed, 09 Nov 2011 12:34:34 +0000

As our loyal readers already know, Michael Grätzel invented dye-sensitized solar cells 20 years ago, but, despite their low price, these organic cells have proved rather inefficient. However, Grätzel now found a solution for the cells to be cheaper and more efficient. Grätzel’s cells use organic dyes to absorb sunlight, which hits the titanium dioxide […]

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Cheap Hydrogen Obtained By Using Ethanol and Sunlight

Ovidiu Sandru — Tue, 31 May 2011 18:58:23 +0000

Not only one time had ethanol been tested as a reliable source of hydrogen. Now, a multi-national team of scientists from Spain, Scotland and New Zealand have devised a method to use ethanol and sunlight to extract hydrogen for use in fuel cells to generate electricity.

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Atom-Thick Coating Helps Researchers Achieve Artificial Photosynthesis

Ovidiu Sandru — Wed, 11 May 2011 18:24:32 +0000

By growing layers of zinc oxide and titanium dioxide on a semiconductor surface, researchers from the ÃƒÆ’Ã¢â‚¬Â°cole polytechnique fÃƒÆ’©dÃƒÆ’©rale de Lausanne (EPFL) have managed to create solar cells that can ultimately extract hydrogen from water under the direct action of sunlight, just like leaves do their natural photosynthesis.

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MIT Engineered Virus Could Make Solar Cells More Efficient

Ovidiu Sandru — Tue, 26 Apr 2011 17:52:42 +0000

Viruses are mostly seen as the bad side of nature, the fallen creation or just that unwanted flu during those sunny days when you were supposed to go play outside. For Angela Belcher viruses are working tools, since she and her MIT colleagues have just found a way to guide some of them so they make solar cells more efficient, by as much as a third.

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Delft Students Make Titanium Dioxide Nanocrystals Help Fuel Cells Become More Efficient

Ovidiu Sandru — Mon, 28 Mar 2011 18:23:54 +0000

Fuel cells can have a hope of improvement due to a discovery by TU Delft researchers in Holland. They added minuscule titanium dioxide crystals to solid electrolytes to make them more conductive. Unlike liquid electrolytes, solid ones have the advantage of being more stable and easier to be contained. Electrolytes are also used mainly in batteries, between their two electrodes.

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Black Titanium Dioxide Helps Hydrogen Ouf of Water, Berkeley Scientists Find

Ovidiu Sandru — Thu, 03 Feb 2011 13:10:49 +0000

They used titanium dioxide (TiO2) whose lattice structure had been modified by changing its ordered pattern. They did that by hydrogenating the TiO2 crystals and found out that the disordered titanium dioxide they obtained was black, hence the idea that it absorbs light much better than the white one.

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Air-Purifying Concrete Paving Stones Remove Nitrogen Oxides from Vehicle Emissions

Mike Sandru — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 16:12:15 +0000

Researchers from the Eindhoven University of Technology in the Netherlands claim to have invented a new type of paving material that actually removes some pollutants from the air as vehicles travel over the surface. Combined with concrete or normal asphalt, the new material is able to eliminate 25% to 45% of nitrogen oxides from vehicle gases.

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Newly Discovered TiO2-Coated Nanotubes Could Build Better Li-Ion Battery Electrodes

Ovidiu Sandru — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 15:29:28 +0000

Titanium dioxide (TiO2) by itself makes up a very low performance electrode, because the electrons move very slowly through it (can take years until you could fill a millimiter-thick TiO2 piece). When you reduce its thickness, though, TiO2 acts like a very good electrode.

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Thin-Film Panchromatic Solar Cells: Next Generation of Solar Efficiency

Cristi — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 20:07:05 +0000

A Korean team led by Nam-Gyu Park has recently made a breakthrough discovery in solar cell development. This discovery will not only increase the efficiency of thin-film panchromatic solar cells but as well the use of clean and reusable energy on the entire globe.

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Paint Your House With Solar Powered Paint!

Ovidiu Sandru — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 19:37:09 +0000

Two UK researchers, David Worsley and Maarten Wijdekop have made up a paint that could produce electricity by gathering the energy from the Sun. A consortium led by Swansea University in the UK hopes to use that process to cover steel sheets with a photovoltaic paint at up to 40 square metres per minute.The paint […]

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