Recent Patents on Engineering - Volume 2, Issue 3, 2008

Industrialised nations have a legacy of contaminated land, which is often abandoned and derelict, and pose unprecedented risks to human health, animals and protected resources like surface and groundwater, flora and fauna, and the ecosystem as a whole. The management and clean-up processes of these lands are complex and time intensive, with high cost overruns and depend on input from a range of disciplines. This Read More

Titanium dioxide represents an effective photocatalyst for water and air purification and for self-cleaning surfaces. Additionally, it can be used as antibacterial agent because of strong oxidation activity and superhydrophilicity. TiO2 shows relatively high reactivity and chemical stability under ultraviolet light (λ<387nm), whose energy exceeds the band gap of 3.3 eV in the anatase crystalline phase. The development of photoc Read More

Some recent patents on tensegrity structures are reviewed and placed in the context of previous patents and other state-of-the-art research. While new applications seem to elaborate on the potential of tensegrity design for the construction of modern lightweight structures in environmental engineering and related fields, the fundamental design principles underlying such structures and their complex geometry and mechanic Read More

A large number of recent patents for cooling of high power electronic components are reviewed. Along with the progresses in the developments of material, fabrication, and packaging techniques, various single and two phase cooling devices are developed for thermal managements of electronic devices. In this respect, practical patents for heatsink developments and implementations of nanotechnology and two-phase Read More

Anaerobic ammonium oxidation process with nitrite to N2 (anammox) has become a main focus and been widely introduced as a cost-effective biological nitrogen removal way in wastewater treatment. This paper reviews various patents which were well developed to achieve this process, such as SHARON-Anammox, CANON, and OLAND. To deal with the long start-up period problem of anammox process, the methods for c Read More

Enzymes are proteins that catalyze chemical reactions. Unlike more traditional organic and inorganic catalysts, enzymes are large and fragile molecules, so over the years, scientists and engineers have found it more difficult to immobilize enzyme catalysts on easily separateable supports for use and re-use in a variety of technologies. Over the last decade, enzyme immobilization has become more important in industry, m Read More

The purpose of liquid atomizing is to increase the surface area of droplets and thereby raise the reaction speed with the surrounding air and enhance the effects of the heat and mass transfer. Higher surface to volume ratio can lead to increase contact areas between droplets and ambient air, and thereby achieve better atomization. Atomization is used for a wide range of applications in many fields, ranging from s Read More

The concerns of energy consumption and environmental pollution urge researchers to work on the development of clean energy and the utilization of waste energy. Sorts of novel technologies were developed and the achievements were patented. Among these patents, chemical heat pump system, is one important topic. It utilizes the transformation between potential energy and thermal power energy to realize the perform Read More

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