Grey fabric could save the day
8 Dec 2010 by Evoluted New Media
An ordinary-looking piece of grey fabric could be a life saver as it has been designed to filter out and destroy incredibly toxic materials in minute concentrations
An ordinary-looking piece of grey fabric could be a life saver as it has been designed to filter out and destroy incredibly toxic materials in minute concentrations
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It doesn’t look like much, but this fabric can filter out toxic chemicals at concentrations as low as parts per million |
The activated carbon cloth (ACC) – originally developed to protect soldiers from chemical attacks in the 1980s – can be used to create extremely reactive hydroxyl radicals, chemicals which are so unstable they react instantly with pollutants, even in concentrations as low as parts per million.
“The material is well known but we are looking at new applications, in particular for activated carbon cloth,” Professor David Bremner from the University of Abertay Dundee told Laboratory News.
Research into how activated carbon powder or grain can be used is plentiful, but using it as a fabric has a number of advantages. The fabric contains lots of tiny pores which adsorb the organic molecules onto the surface via weak Van der Waals forces, said Ian Johnson, director of Carbon Filter Technology who worked with Bremner. The pollutants react with oxidant molecules on the surface of the cloth, converting them into smaller molecules.
“We measured the removal of the model compound phenol from water by direct adsorption and by adsorption/oxidation (both processes occur in the presence of an oxidant) with hydrogen peroxide or ozone,” Bremner added, “The ACC is highly active in generating hydroxyl radicals which carry out the degradation of pollutants in the so-called advanced oxidation process (AOP).”
Carbon Filter Technology already produce versions of the material for medical clean rooms, air and water filtration and highly advance wound dressings, but it could be used in hospitals and care homes to remove unpleasant odours from ostomy bags or to protect sensitive equipment. It could also be used on larger scales like industrial chemical plants to remove drugs and waste from water before it enters the sewage system. Using the ACC in conjunction with ozone removes even more potentially dangerous organic content, the research found.
“Carbon Filter Technology is examining its uses for a variety of industrial purposes,” Bremner told Laboratory News, “We are furthering our work on pollutant degradation but are also investigating it as a potential method for rapid and easy determination of the use of accelerants in suspected arson attacks.”
