Chemistry Nexus
by WebElements: the periodic table on the web
A further step towards nuclear fusion?
The media cover a story that scientists at the German Max Planck Institute produced a helium plasma contained for about a tenth of a second but at about 1000000 K. The next step at the Wendelstein 7-X (a stellarator fusion reactor) is to increase the stability of the plasma, to improve the heating method, and to increase the plasma temperature.
WebElements December 20th, 2015
Posted In: Nuclear chemistry
Tags: deuterium, Helium, Hydrogen, nuclear fusion
Might future fuel cells be nickel based?
There seems to be a possibility that nickel compounds might help in the electrolysis of water, the reaction at the centre of hydrogen fuel cells. Researchers at the Joseph Fourier University in Grenoble, and at the French Atomic Energy Commission in Gif-sur-Yvette and attached a nickel compound that mimics hydrogenase enzymes (catalysts) and attached it to the surface of carbon nanotubes.
WebElements December 12th, 2009
Posted In: Catalysis, Chemistry
Tags: Hydrogen, hydrogenase, Nickel, Oxygen, water
Self-cleaning titania nanotube hydrogen sensors
The Science Blog reports that researchers at Penn State in the USA are developing self-cleaning titania nanotube hydrogen sensors. The hydrogen sensors are titania nanotubes coated with a discontinuous layer of palladium. Hydrogen sensors are widely used in the chemical, petroleum and semiconductor industries. They are also used as diagnostic tools to monitor certain types of bacterial infections.
“The photocatalytic properties of titania nanotubes are so large – a factor of 100 times greater than any other form of titania – that sensor contaminants are efficiently removed with exposure to ultraviolet light, so that the sensors effectively recover or retain their original hydrogen sensitivity in real world application”
“By doping the titania nanotubes with trace amounts of different metals such as tin, gold, silver, copper, niobium and others, a wide variety of chemical sensors can be made.
WebElements December 9th, 2009
Posted In: Chemistry
Tags: Copper, Gold, Hydrogen, Niobium, Palladium, Silver, Tin, titania, Titanium
Hydrogen oxygen alloy
Researchers at the Carnegie Institution of Washington (Washington DC, USA) have managed to make a remarkable alloy of hydrogen and oxygen from water! They used X-rays to dissociate water at high pressure to form a solid mixture, that is, an alloy, of molecular oxygen (O2) and molecular hydrogen (H2).
The researchers placed some water under an extremely high pressure, about 170,000 atmospheres (17 Gigapascals), using a diamond anvil and then beamed high-energy X-rays at the water.
WebElements October 26th, 2006
Posted In: Chemistry
Deadly poison hydrogen sulfide induces suspended animation
Researchers from the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston (USA) have announced that hydrogen sulfide (sulphide) gas, H2S, can induce a state of suspended animation in mice while maintaining normal blood pressure. It is hoped that this result eventually will help in the treatment critically-ill patients. This result was presented at the American Physiological Society conference, “Comparative Physiology 2006: Integrating Diversity,” in Virginia Beach, Virginia, USA, October 2006 (link no longer available but see this BBC report).
WebElements October 9th, 2006
Posted In: Chemistry
Tags: Hydrogen, hydrogen sulfide, sulfur