This bong-style faucet was designed by Yonggu Do, Dohyung Kim & Sewon Oh, which was feature on yankodesign.com. The Faucet is touted to save water by forcing the user to wait for the one-liter reservoir to fill back up after use.
Via Gizmodo
Showing posts with label Enviromental Science. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Enviromental Science. Show all posts
Sunday, February 06, 2011
Save That Water, Use This Bong-Style Faucet
This bong-style faucet was designed by Yonggu Do, Dohyung Kim & Sewon Oh, which was feature on yankodesign.com. The Faucet is touted to save water by forcing the user to wait for the one-liter reservoir to fill back up after use.
Via Gizmodo
Friday, February 04, 2011
New Approach To Solar Cells
An interdisciplinary team of UC Davis and UC Santa Cruz researchers is taking a novel approach to solar power, one that promises to lead to a technological breakthrough. By using nanoparticles of germanium, silicon and other materials, the researchers hope to produce solar cells far more efficient than the current state of the art.
The project was recently awarded $1.5 million over three years from the National Science Foundation.
Conventional solar cells all operate on the same principle of "one photon in, one electron out," said Gergely Zimanyi, professor of physics at UC Davis and principal investigator on the NSF grant. In other words, one particle of light, or photon, hits the solar cell and generates one electron to produce an electrical current.
The efficiency — energy out compared to energy in — of a solar cell operating according to this principle is capped by a theoretical maximum of 31 percent. But by constructing solar cells from extremely small nanoparticles, the UC researchers aim to generate several electrons for each photon, raising the maximum efficiency to between 42 and 65 percent.
The one-photon-in/multiple-electrons-out paradigm has been demonstrated at the Los Alamos National Laboratory, Zimanyi said — but the Los Alamos group did not build a functioning solar cell based on this paradigm. The UC Davis/UC Santa Cruz team includes scientists with experience making solar cells from nanoparticles, giving hope that the group will be able to construct a fully functioning and well-optimized solar cell from germanium and silicon nanoparticles, he said.
The team members are: Zimanyi; UC Davis chemistry professors Susan Kauzlarich and Delmar Larsen; Professor Giulia Galli, who holds a joint appointment in physics and chemistry; Professor Zhaojun Bai, Department of Mathematics and Computer Science; Debashis Paul, professor in the Department of Statistics; and Susan Carter, professor of physics at UC Santa Cruz.
The interdisciplinary nature of the team was crucial to getting the proposal funded, Zimanyi said. "NSF asked for a collaborative effort between materials sciences, chemistry and mathematical sciences," he said.
Zimanyi, Galli and Bai will conduct theoretical and computer-modeling studies, with Paul providing statistical expertise; Kauzlarich's lab will synthesize the new nanoparticles, Larsen's group will characterize them and Carter's lab at UCSC will develop a working device. A prototype cell has been already constructed prior to getting the grant and exhibited an efficiency of about 8 percent, which Zimanyi described as a very encouraging result given the limited resources going into its construction.
The team will collaborate with the California Solar Energy Collaborative, which is based at UC Davis and led by Pieter Stroeve, professor of chemical engineering and materials science. The team also plans an outreach effort, primarily via its public webpage: http://www.solarwiki.ucdavis.edu/.
Source: Reprinted news release via University of California - Davis
The project was recently awarded $1.5 million over three years from the National Science Foundation.
Conventional solar cells all operate on the same principle of "one photon in, one electron out," said Gergely Zimanyi, professor of physics at UC Davis and principal investigator on the NSF grant. In other words, one particle of light, or photon, hits the solar cell and generates one electron to produce an electrical current.
The efficiency — energy out compared to energy in — of a solar cell operating according to this principle is capped by a theoretical maximum of 31 percent. But by constructing solar cells from extremely small nanoparticles, the UC researchers aim to generate several electrons for each photon, raising the maximum efficiency to between 42 and 65 percent.
The one-photon-in/multiple-electrons-out paradigm has been demonstrated at the Los Alamos National Laboratory, Zimanyi said — but the Los Alamos group did not build a functioning solar cell based on this paradigm. The UC Davis/UC Santa Cruz team includes scientists with experience making solar cells from nanoparticles, giving hope that the group will be able to construct a fully functioning and well-optimized solar cell from germanium and silicon nanoparticles, he said.
The team members are: Zimanyi; UC Davis chemistry professors Susan Kauzlarich and Delmar Larsen; Professor Giulia Galli, who holds a joint appointment in physics and chemistry; Professor Zhaojun Bai, Department of Mathematics and Computer Science; Debashis Paul, professor in the Department of Statistics; and Susan Carter, professor of physics at UC Santa Cruz.
The interdisciplinary nature of the team was crucial to getting the proposal funded, Zimanyi said. "NSF asked for a collaborative effort between materials sciences, chemistry and mathematical sciences," he said.
Zimanyi, Galli and Bai will conduct theoretical and computer-modeling studies, with Paul providing statistical expertise; Kauzlarich's lab will synthesize the new nanoparticles, Larsen's group will characterize them and Carter's lab at UCSC will develop a working device. A prototype cell has been already constructed prior to getting the grant and exhibited an efficiency of about 8 percent, which Zimanyi described as a very encouraging result given the limited resources going into its construction.
The team will collaborate with the California Solar Energy Collaborative, which is based at UC Davis and led by Pieter Stroeve, professor of chemical engineering and materials science. The team also plans an outreach effort, primarily via its public webpage: http://www.solarwiki.ucdavis.edu/.
Source: Reprinted news release via University of California - Davis
Wednesday, January 05, 2011
Filtering Kitchen Wastewater For Plants
Water is a precious commodity, so finding ways to re-use waste water, especially in arid regions is essential to sustainability. Researchers in India have now carried out a study of various waste water filtration systems for kitchen waste water and found that even the most poorly performing can produce water clean enough for horticultural or agricultural use. They report details in the International Journal of Environmental Technology and Management.
Recycling domestic wastewater is becoming an important part of water management and emerging technology and a shift in attitude to waste in the developing world means that more people would be willing to re-use this so-called gray water given the choice. Unfortunately, affordable and effective domestic wastewater treatment is not yet available particularly in parts of the world where financial and technical constraints are acute. Nevertheless domestic wastewater from showers, kitchen sinks and laundry washing in homes and offices offers a potential resource that differs from industrial wastewater. Domestic waste water might contain an organic load from food processing, utensil washing in the kitchen, soap and detergents, with the main contaminants being proteins, carbohydrates, detergents, oil and grease and other dissolved and suspended compounds.
Subrata Dasgupta of the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, in Kolkata, and colleagues have explored the potential of ceramic microfiltration membrane s used alone or in conjunction with different physicochemical treatments, such as biotreatment and adsorption, for cleaning up dirty dishwater. The team compared cross-flow microfiltration (CMF) with tubular ceramic membranes in single channel and multichannel configurations. Biotreatment involved using activated sludge or an adsorptive treatment based on the prepared dried roots of Eichhornia crassipes, an aquatic weed that grows well in polluted water.
The researchers found that, as one might expect, a 19-channel ceramic membrane performed better in terms of permeate quality than a single-channel filter. In terms of BOD (biological oxygen demand), COD (chemical oxygen demand), turbidity, TSS (total suspended solids), microfiltration of the waste water treated with adsorbent appeared to be most promising compared with other the approaches tested. In that approach, 98% removal of BOD and 99% removal of COD were seen. The quality of the treated water was found to be fit for use in horticulture and irrigation, the team concludes.
Source: Reprinted news release via Inderscience Publishers
Recycling domestic wastewater is becoming an important part of water management and emerging technology and a shift in attitude to waste in the developing world means that more people would be willing to re-use this so-called gray water given the choice. Unfortunately, affordable and effective domestic wastewater treatment is not yet available particularly in parts of the world where financial and technical constraints are acute. Nevertheless domestic wastewater from showers, kitchen sinks and laundry washing in homes and offices offers a potential resource that differs from industrial wastewater. Domestic waste water might contain an organic load from food processing, utensil washing in the kitchen, soap and detergents, with the main contaminants being proteins, carbohydrates, detergents, oil and grease and other dissolved and suspended compounds.
Subrata Dasgupta of the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, in Kolkata, and colleagues have explored the potential of ceramic microfiltration membrane s used alone or in conjunction with different physicochemical treatments, such as biotreatment and adsorption, for cleaning up dirty dishwater. The team compared cross-flow microfiltration (CMF) with tubular ceramic membranes in single channel and multichannel configurations. Biotreatment involved using activated sludge or an adsorptive treatment based on the prepared dried roots of Eichhornia crassipes, an aquatic weed that grows well in polluted water.
The researchers found that, as one might expect, a 19-channel ceramic membrane performed better in terms of permeate quality than a single-channel filter. In terms of BOD (biological oxygen demand), COD (chemical oxygen demand), turbidity, TSS (total suspended solids), microfiltration of the waste water treated with adsorbent appeared to be most promising compared with other the approaches tested. In that approach, 98% removal of BOD and 99% removal of COD were seen. The quality of the treated water was found to be fit for use in horticulture and irrigation, the team concludes.
Source: Reprinted news release via Inderscience Publishers
Is The Hornet Our Key To Renewable Energy?
Tel Aviv University discovers that the outer shell of a hornet can harvest solar power
As every middle-school child knows, in the process of photosynthesis, plants take the sun's energy and convert it to electrical energy. Now a Tel Aviv University team has demonstrated how a member of the animal kingdom, the Oriental hornet, takes the sun's energy and converts it into electric power -- in the brown and yellow parts of its body -- as well.
"The interesting thing here is that a living biological creature does a thing like that," says physicist Prof. David Bergman of Tel Aviv University's School of Physics and Astronomy, who was part of the team that made discovery. "The hornet may have discovered things we do not yet know." In partnership with the late Prof. Jacob Ishay of the university's Sackler Faculty of Medicine, Prof. Bergman and his doctoral candidate Marian Plotkin engaged in a truly interdisciplinary research project to explain the biological processes that turn a hornet's abdomen into solar cells.
The research team made the discovery several years ago, and recently tried to mimic it. The results show that the hornet's body shell, or exoskeleton, is able to harvest solar energy. They were recently published in the German journal Naturwissenschaften.
Discovering a new system for renewable energy?
Previously, entomologists noted that Oriental wasps, unlike other wasps and bees, are active in the afternoon rather than the morning when the sun is just rising. They also noticed that the hornet digs more intensely as the sun's intensity increases.
Taking this information to the lab, the Tel Aviv University team studied weather conditions like temperature, humidity and solar radiation to determine if and how these factors also affected the hornet's behavior, but found that UVB radiation alone dictated the change.
In the course of their research, the Tel Aviv University team also found that the yellow and brown stripes on the hornet abdomen enable a photo-voltaic effect: the brown and yellow stripes on the hornet abdomen can absorb solar radiation, and the yellow pigment transforms that into electric power.
The team determined that the brown shell of the hornet was made from grooves that split light into diverging beams. The yellow stripe on the abdomen is made from pinhole depressions, and contains a pigment called xanthopterin. Together, the light diverging grooves, pinhole depressions and xanthopterin change light into electrical energy. The shell traps the light and the pigment does the conversion.
A biological heat pump
The researchers also found a number of energy processes unique to the insect. Like air conditioners and refrigerators, the hornet has a well-developed heat pump system in its body which keeps it cooler than the outside temperature while it forages in the sun. This is something that's not easy to do, says Prof. Bergman.
To see if the solar collecting prowess of the hornet could be duplicated, the team imitated the structure of the hornet's body but had poor results in achieving the same high efficiency rates of energy collection. In the future, they plan to refine the model to see if this "bio-mimicry" can give clues to novel renewable energy solutions.
The research team also discovered that hornets use finely honed acoustic signals to guide them so they can build their combs with extraordinary precision in total darkness. Bees can at least see what they are doing, explains Prof. Bergman, but hornets cannot -- it's totally dark inside a hornet nest.
Source: Reprinted news release via American Friends of Tel Aviv University
As every middle-school child knows, in the process of photosynthesis, plants take the sun's energy and convert it to electrical energy. Now a Tel Aviv University team has demonstrated how a member of the animal kingdom, the Oriental hornet, takes the sun's energy and converts it into electric power -- in the brown and yellow parts of its body -- as well.
"The interesting thing here is that a living biological creature does a thing like that," says physicist Prof. David Bergman of Tel Aviv University's School of Physics and Astronomy, who was part of the team that made discovery. "The hornet may have discovered things we do not yet know." In partnership with the late Prof. Jacob Ishay of the university's Sackler Faculty of Medicine, Prof. Bergman and his doctoral candidate Marian Plotkin engaged in a truly interdisciplinary research project to explain the biological processes that turn a hornet's abdomen into solar cells.
The research team made the discovery several years ago, and recently tried to mimic it. The results show that the hornet's body shell, or exoskeleton, is able to harvest solar energy. They were recently published in the German journal Naturwissenschaften.
Discovering a new system for renewable energy?
Previously, entomologists noted that Oriental wasps, unlike other wasps and bees, are active in the afternoon rather than the morning when the sun is just rising. They also noticed that the hornet digs more intensely as the sun's intensity increases.
Taking this information to the lab, the Tel Aviv University team studied weather conditions like temperature, humidity and solar radiation to determine if and how these factors also affected the hornet's behavior, but found that UVB radiation alone dictated the change.
In the course of their research, the Tel Aviv University team also found that the yellow and brown stripes on the hornet abdomen enable a photo-voltaic effect: the brown and yellow stripes on the hornet abdomen can absorb solar radiation, and the yellow pigment transforms that into electric power.
The team determined that the brown shell of the hornet was made from grooves that split light into diverging beams. The yellow stripe on the abdomen is made from pinhole depressions, and contains a pigment called xanthopterin. Together, the light diverging grooves, pinhole depressions and xanthopterin change light into electrical energy. The shell traps the light and the pigment does the conversion.
A biological heat pump
The researchers also found a number of energy processes unique to the insect. Like air conditioners and refrigerators, the hornet has a well-developed heat pump system in its body which keeps it cooler than the outside temperature while it forages in the sun. This is something that's not easy to do, says Prof. Bergman.
To see if the solar collecting prowess of the hornet could be duplicated, the team imitated the structure of the hornet's body but had poor results in achieving the same high efficiency rates of energy collection. In the future, they plan to refine the model to see if this "bio-mimicry" can give clues to novel renewable energy solutions.
The research team also discovered that hornets use finely honed acoustic signals to guide them so they can build their combs with extraordinary precision in total darkness. Bees can at least see what they are doing, explains Prof. Bergman, but hornets cannot -- it's totally dark inside a hornet nest.
Source: Reprinted news release via American Friends of Tel Aviv University
Tuesday, January 04, 2011
The first decade of the 2000s warmer than the preceding decades in Finland
The difference between the mean temperature for the past decade and the mean temperature for the reference period 1971–2000 is greater in Northern Finland than in Southern Finland. Generally, the mean temperature is 0.5–1° C higher than during the reference period. However, in many places in Lapland, the mean temperature is 1–1.5° C higher than during the reference period.
Winters have warmed up the most
When the first decade of the 2000s is examined by seasons, the temperatures for all seasons are among the two warmest within the past 160 years.
When the decade is compared against the climate prevailing in 1971–2000, the greatest difference is seen in the mean temperatures of winters, i.e. the periods from December to February. In Lapland, the mean temperature of the winters in 2001–2010 was over 1.5 degrees higher than normally. Elsewhere in the country as well, the difference was 0.5–1.5 degrees. The winters were unusually mild especially in 2006–2009, and the winter of 2007–2008 was the mildest during Finland’s entire measurement history. During the past decade, only the winters of 2002–2003 and 2009–2010 were colder than average. Both were unusually cold when compared against the period 1971–2000.
The mean temperatures of other seasons have also risen when compared against the average for 1971–2000, but not as much as winter temperatures. For instance, the mean temperature of summers in 2001–2010 was 0.5–1° C higher than the average for 1971–2000 in virtually all of Finland.
More rains in winter
There was no significant difference between precipitation for the first decade of the 2000s and the average for 1971–2000. When precipitation figures for the various seasons are compared to the average precipitation in 1971–2000, precipitation during winters and sometimes during springs has been greater than during the reference period, while precipitation during autumns has remained below the average.
Source: Reprinted news release via Finnish Meteorological Institute
