Touratech Guardo Adventure Gloves with Nanotechnology

When the engineers at Touratech designed the new Guardo Adventure Glove, they took into account all of the conditions riders face during a motorcycle trip.

From terrain to climate, everything was considered when Guardo was created. The result is a highly functional, breathable, protective and comfortable glove that’s perfect for any ride, no matter what is encountered.

Sharktec® Nanotechnology is widely used in tactical applications and was a clear choice for the palm and fingers of the Guardo Adventure Glove. 

Sharktec® is cut and fire resistant, vibration damping, and provides incredible grip even when wet or oily. It feels rubbery and flexible, but is one of the toughest glove materials on the planet.

After a day in the saddle (at the KTM Ultimate Race Qualifier) wearing the Guardo Adventure Gloves I can confidently say these are the best adventure-specific gloves I have ever used. – Iain Glynn, Chief Riding Officer, Touratech-USA

Along with the Sharktec® palm and fingers, Touratech utilized only the optimum materials for adventure riding gloves with a supple goatskin shell, neoprene and spandex on the backs of the fingers supplemented by hand heel and hand edge reinforcement with Superfabric©. The fingertips are touchscreen friendly and the soft finger knuckle protectors are next-level quality.

Touratech’s Guardo Adventuregloves are ideally suited for anything an adventure can throw at the rider.

Touratech-USA.com

How a ‘solar battery’ could bring electricity to rural areas – A ‘solar flow’ battery could “Harvest (energy) in the Daytime and Provide Electricity in the Evening

New solar flow battery with a 14.1 percent efficiency. Photo: David Tenenbaum, UW-Madison

Solar energy is becoming more and more popular as prices drop, yet a home powered by the Sun isn’t free from the grid because solar panels don’t store energy for later. Now, researchers have refined a device that can both harvest and store solar energy, and they hope it will one day bring electricity to rural and underdeveloped areas.

The problem of energy storage has led to many creative solutions, like giant batteries. For a paper published today in the journal Chem, scientists trying to improve the solar cells themselves developed an integrated battery that works in three different ways.

It can work like a normal solar cell by converting sunlight to electricity immediately, explains study author Song Jin, a chemist at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. It can store the solar energy, or it can simply be charged like a normal battery.

“IT COULD HARVEST IN THE DAYTIME, PROVIDE ELECTRICITY IN THE EVENING.”

It’s a combination of two existing technologies: solar cells that harvest light, and a so-called flow battery.

The most commonly used batteries, lithium-ion, store energy in solid materials, like various metals. Flow batteries, on the other hand, store energy in external liquid tanks.

What is A ‘Flow Battery’

This means they are very easy to scale for large projects. Scaling up all the components of a lithium-ion battery might throw off the engineering, but for flow batteries, “you just make the tank bigger,” says Timothy Cook, a University at Buffalo chemist and flow battery expert not involved in the study.

“You really simplify how to make the battery grow in capacity,” he adds. “We’re not making flow batteries to power a cell phone, we’re thinking about buildings or industrial sites.

Jin and his team were the first to combine the two features. They have been working on the battery for years, and have now reached 14.1 percent efficiency.

Jin calls this “round-trip efficiency” — as in, the efficiency from taking that energy, storing it, and discharging it. “We can probably get to 20 percent efficiency in the next few years, and I think 25 percent round-trip is not out of the question,” Jin says.

Apart from improving efficiency, Jin and his team want to develop a better design that can use cheaper materials.

The invention is still at proof-of-concept stage, but he thinks it could have a large impact in less-developed areas without power grids and proper infrastructure. “There, you could have a medium-scale device like this operate by itself,” he says. “It could harvest in the daytime, provide electricity in the evening.” In many areas, Jin adds, having electricity is a game changer, because it can help people be more connected or enable more clinics to be open and therefore improve health care.

And Cook notes that if the solar flow battery can be scaled, it can still be helpful in the US.

The United States might have plenty of power infrastructure, but with such a device, “you can disconnect and have personalized energy where you’re storing and using what you need locally,” he says. And that could help us be less dependent on forms of energy that harm the environment.

“Harvesting Energy from Light” – ORNL: Multimodal imaging shows strain can drive chemistry in a photovoltaic material –

In a thin film of a solar-energy material, molecules in twin domains (modeled in left and right panels) align in opposing orientations within grain boundaries (shown by scanning electron microscopy in the center panel). Strain can change chemical segregation and may be engineered to tune photovoltaic efficiency. Credit: Stephen Jesse/Oak Ridge National Laboratory, U.S. Dept. of Energy (hi-res image)

OAK RIDGE, Tenn., Sept. 25, 2018—A unique combination of imaging tools and atomic-level simulations has allowed a team led by the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory to solve a longstanding debate about the properties of a promising material that can harvest energy from light.

The researchers used multimodal imaging to “see” nanoscale interactions within a thin film of hybrid organic–inorganic perovskite, a material useful for solar cells.

They determined that the material is ferroelastic, meaning it can form domains of polarized strain to minimize elastic energy. This finding was contrary to previous assumptions that the material is ferroelectric, meaning it can form domains of polarized electric charge to minimize electric energy.

“We found that people were misguided by the mechanical signal in standard electromechanical measurements, resulting in the misinterpretation of ferroelectricity,” said Yongtao Liu of ORNL, whose contribution to the study became a focus of his PhD thesis at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville (UTK).

Olga Ovchinnikova, who directed the experiments at ORNL’s Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences (CNMS), added, “We used multimodal chemical imaging—scanning probe microscopy combined with mass spectrometry and optical spectroscopy—to show that this material is ferroelastic and how the ferroelasticity drives chemical segregation.”

The findings, reported in Nature Materials, revealed that differential strains cause ionized molecules to migrate and segregate within regions of the film, resulting in local chemistry that may affect the transport of electric charge.

The understanding that this unique suite of imaging tools enables allows researchers to better correlate structure and function and fine-tune energy-harvesting films for improved performance.

“We want to predictively make grains of particular sizes and geometries,” Liu said. “The geometry is going to control the strain, and the strain is going to control the local chemistry.”

For their experiment, the researchers made a thin film by spin-casting a perovskite on an indium tin oxide–coated glass substrate. This process created the conductive, transparent surface a photovoltaic device would need—but also generated strain.

To relieve the strain, tiny ferroelastic domains formed. One type of domain was “grains,” which look like what you might see flying over farmland with patches of different crops skewed in relation to one another. Within grains, sub-domains formed, similar to rows of two plant types alternating in a patch of farmland. These adjacent but opposing rows are “twin domains” of segregated chemicals.

The technique that scientists previously used to claim the material was ferroelectric was piezoresponse force microscopy (“piezo” means “pressure), in which the tip of an atomic force microscope (AFM) measures a mechanical displacement due to its coupling with electric polarization—namely, electromechanical displacement. “But you’re not actually measuring the true displacement of the material,” Ovchinnikova warned. “You’re measuring the deflection of this whole ‘diving board’ of the cantilever.” Therefore, the researchers used a new measurement technique to separate cantilever dynamics from displacement of the material due to piezoresponse—the Interferometric Displacement Sensor (IDS) option for the Cypher AFM, developed by co-author Roger Proksch, CEO of Oxford Instruments Asylum Research.

They found the response in this material is from cantilever dynamics alone and is not a true piezoresponse, proving the material is not ferroelectric.

“Our work shows the effect believed due to ferroelectric polarization can be explained by chemical segregation,” Liu said.

The study’s diverse microscopy and spectroscopy measurements provided experimental data to validate atomic-level simulations. The simulations bring predictive insights that could be used to design future materials.

“We’re able to do this because of the unique environment at CNMS where we have characterization, theory and synthesis all under one roof,” Ovchinnikova said.

“We didn’t just utilize mass spectrometry because [it] gives you information about local chemistry. We also used optical spectroscopy and simulations to look at the orientation of the molecules, which is important for understanding these materials. Such a cohesive chemical imaging capability at ORNL leverages our functional imaging.”

Collaborations with industry allow ORNL to have unique tools available for scientists, including those that settled the debate about the true nature of the light-harvesting material. For example, an instrument that uses helium ion microscopy (HIM) to remove and ionize molecules was coupled with a secondary ion mass spectroscopy (SIMS) to identify molecules based on their weights.

The HIM-SIMS instrument ZEISS ORION NanoFab was made available to ORNL from developer ZEISS for beta testing and is one of only two such instruments in the world. Similarly, the IDS instrument from Asylum Research, which is a laser Doppler vibrometer, was also made available to ORNL for beta testing and is the only one in existence.

“Oak Ridge National Laboratory researchers are naturally a good fit for working with industry because they possess unique expertise and are able to first use the tools the way they’re meant to,” said Proksch of Asylum. “ORNL has a facility [CNMS] that makes instruments and expertise available to many scientific users who can test tools on different problems and provide strong feedback during beta testing as vendors develop and improve the tools, in this case our new IDS metrological AFM.”

The title of the paper is “Chemical Nature of Ferroelastic Twin Domains in CH3NH3PbI3 Perovskite.”

The research was supported by ORNL’s Laboratory Directed Research and Development Program and conducted at CNMS, a DOE Office of Science User Facility at ORNL.

UT-Battelle manages ORNL for DOE’s Office of Science. The single largest supporter of basic research in the physical sciences in the United States, the Office of Science is working to address some of the most pressing challenges of our time. For more information, please visit https://science.energy.gov/.

Bridging the Gap Between Electronics and Biology: University of Maryland – James Clark School of Enginering

Microelectronic devices – from pacemakers to cellphones – have long shaped the course of human health and telecommunications. But, scientists have struggled to navigate the technology gap between microelectronics and the biological world.

For example, today’s consumers cannot tap into their smartphones to uncover information about an infection or illness affecting their body, nor can they use their phones to signal a device to administer an antibiotic or drug.

One of the primary reasons for this disconnect between the body and everyday technology is that microelectronic devices process information using materials such as silicon, gold, or chemicals, and an energy source that provides electrons; but, free electrons do not exist in biology. As such, scientists encounter a major roadblock in their efforts to bridge the gap between biological systems and microelectronics.

But, engineers at the University of Maryland’s A. James Clark School of Engineering, along with researchers from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and the U.S. Army Research Laboratory, may have found a loophole.

In biological systems, there exists a small class of molecules capable of shuttling electrons. These molecules, known as “redox” molecules, can transport electrons to any location. But, redox molecules must first undergo a series of chemical reactions – oxidation or reduction reactions – to transport electrons to the intended target.

By engineering cells with synthetic biology components, the research team has experimentally demonstrated a proof-of-concept device enabling robust and reliable information exchanges between electrical and biological (molecular) domains.

“Devices that freely exchange information between the electronic and biological worlds would represent a completely new societal paradigm,” said bioengineering professor William E. Bentley, director of the UMD Robert E. Fischell Institute for Biomedical Devices. “It has only been about 60 years since the implantable pacemaker and defibrillator proved what devices could achieve by electronically stimulating ion currents. Imagine what we could do by transferring all the knowledge contained in our molecular space, by tapping into and controlling molecules such as glucose, hormones, DNA, proteins, or polysaccharides in addition to ions.”

Building on their progress, the research team is now working to develop a novel biological memory device that can be written to and read from via either biological and/or electronic means. Such a device would function like a thumb drive or SD card, using molecular signals to store key information, and would require almost no energy. Inside the body, these devices would serve the same purpose – except, instead of merely storing data, they could be used to control biological behaviors.

“For years, microelectronic circuits have had limited capabilities in maximizing their computing and storage capacities, mainly due to the physical constraints that the building-block inorganic materials – such as silicon – imposed upon them,” said UMD professor Reza Ghodssi, who specializes in electrical and computer engineering. “By exploring and utilizing the world of biology through an integrated and robust interface technology with semiconductor processing, we expect to address those limitations by allowing our researchers and students to design and develop first-of-kind innovative and powerful bioelectronic devices and systems.”

The collaborative research team will work to integrate subsystems and create biohybrid circuits to develop an electronically controlled device for the body that interprets molecular information, computes desired outcomes, and electronically actuates cells to signal and control biological populations.

The hope is that such a system could seek out and destroy a bacterial pathogen by recognizing its secreted signaling molecules and synthesizing a pathogen-specific toxin. In this way, the group will, for the first time, explore electronic control of complex biological behaviors.

This year, the group was awarded a $1.5 million National Science Foundation grant through the Semiconductor Synthetic Biology for Information Processing and Storage technologies (SemiSynBio) program. Their earlier related work was published in Nature Communications.

Read about related microbiology research at Maryland.

Researchers Develop Novel Two-Step CO2 Conversion Technology – Could aid in the production of valuable chemicals and fuels

UD Professor Feng Jiao’s team constructed an electrolyser, pictured here, to conduct their novel two-step conversion process.

 

A team of researchers at the University of Delaware’s Center for Catalytic Science and Technology (CCST) has discovered a novel two-step process to increase the efficiency of carbon dioxide (CO2) electrolysis, a chemical reaction driven by electrical currents that can aid in the production of valuable chemicals and fuels.

The results of the team’s study were published Monday, Aug. 20 in Nature Catalysis.

The research team, consisting of Feng Jiao, associate professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering, and graduate students Matthew Jouny and Wesley Luc, obtained their results by constructing a specialized three-chambered device called an electrolyser, which uses electricity to reduce CO2 into smaller molecules.

Compared to fossil fuels, electricity is a much more affordable and environmentally-friendly method for driving chemical processes to produce commercial chemicals and fuels. These can include ethylene, which is used in the production of plastics, and ethanol, a valuable fuel additive.

“This novel electrolysis technology provides a new route to achieve higher selectivities at incredible reaction rates, which is a major step towards commercial applications,” said Jiao, who also serves as associate director of CCST.

Whereas direct CO2 electrolysis is the standard method for reducing carbon dioxide, Jiao’s team broke the electrolysis process into two steps, reducing CO2 into carbon monoxide (CO) and then reducing the CO further into multi-carbon (C2+) products. This two-part approach, said Jiao, presents multiple advantages over the standard method.

“By breaking the process into two steps, we’ve obtained a much higher selectivity towards multi-carbon products than in direct electrolysis,” Jiao said. “The sequential reaction strategy could open up new ways to design more efficient processes for CO2 utilization.”

Electrolysis is also driving Jiao’s research with colleague Bingjun Xu, assistant professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering. In collaboration with researchers at Tianjin University in China, Jiao and Xu are designing a system that could reduce greenhouse gas emissions by using carbon-neutral solar electricity.

“We hope this work will bring more attention to this promising technology for further research and development,” Jiao said. “There are many technical challenges still be solved, but we are working on them!”

Transparent loudspeakers and MICs that let your skin play music – Ultra-Thin Nanomembranes may help the Hearing and Speech Impaired

Their ultrathin, conductive, and transparent hybrid NMs can be applied to the fabrication of skin-attachable NM loudspeakers and voice-recognition microphones, which would be unobtrusive in appearance due to their excellent transparency and conformal contact capability.Credit: UNIST

An international team of researchers, affiliated with UNIST has presented an innovative wearable technology that will turn your skin into a loudspeaker.

This breakthrough has been led by Professor Hyunhyub Ko in the School of Energy and Chemical Engineering at UNIST. Created in part to help the hearing and speech impaired, the new technology can be further explored for various potential applications, such as wearable IoT sensors and conformal health care devices.

In the study, the research team has developed ultrathin, transparent, and conductive hybrid nanomembranes with nanoscale thickness, consisting of an orthogonal silver nanowire array embedded in a polymer matrix. They, then, demonstrated their nanomembrane by making it into a loudspeaker that can be attached to almost anything to produce sounds. The researchers also introduced a similar device, acting as a microphone, which can be connected to smartphones and computers to unlock voice-activated security systems.

Nanomembranes (NMs) are molcularly thin seperation layers with nanoscale thickness. Polymer NMs have attracted considerable attention owing to their outstanding advantages, such as extreme flexibility, ultralight weight, and excellent adhesibility in that they can be attached directly to almost any surface. However, they tear easily and exhibit no electrical conductivity.

The research team has solved such issues by embedding a silver nanowire network within a polymer-based nanomembrane. This has enabled the demonstration of skin-attachable and imperceptible loudspeaker and microphone.

“Our ultrathin, transparent, and conductive hybrid NMs facilitate conformal contact with curvilinear and dynamic surfaces without any cracking or rupture,” says Saewon Kang in the doctroral program of Energy and Chemical Engineering at UNIST, the first author of the study.

He adds, “These layers are capable of detecting sounds and vocal vibrations produced by the triboelectric voltage signals corresponding to sounds, which could be further explored for various potential applications, such as sound input/output devices.”

Using the hybrid NMs, the research team fabricated skin-attachable NM loudspeakers and microphones, which would be unobtrusive in appearance because of their excellent transparency and conformal contact capability. These wearable speakers and microphones are paper-thin, yet still capable of conducting sound signals.

“The biggest breakthrough of our research is the development of ultrathin, transparent, and conductive hybrid nanomembranes with nanoscale thickness, less than 100 nanometers,” says Professor Ko. “These outstanding optical, electrical, and mechanical properties of nanomembranes enable the demonstration of skin-attachable and imperceptible loudspeaker and microphone.”

The skin-attachable NM loudspeakers work by emitting thermoacoustic sound by the temperature-induced oscillation of the surrounding air. The periodic Joule heating that occurs when an electric current passes through a conductor and produces heat leads to these temperature oscillations. It has attracted considerable attention for being a stretchable, transparent, and skin-attachable loudspeaker.

Wearable microphones are sensors, attached to a speaker’s neck to even sense the vibration of the vocal folds. This sensor operates by converting the frictional force generated by the oscillation of the transparent conductive nanofiber into electric energy. For the operation of the microphone, the hybrid nanomembrane is inserted between elastic films with tiny patterns to precisely detect the sound and the vibration of the vocal cords based on a triboelectric voltage that results from the contact with the elastic films.

“For the commercial applications, the mechanical durability of nanomebranes and the performance of loudspeaker and microphone should be improved further,” says Professor Ko.

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Story Source:

Materials provided by Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology(UNIST). Note: Content may be edited for style and length.

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Journal Reference:

1. Saewon Kang, Seungse Cho, Ravi Shanker, Hochan Lee, Jonghwa Park, Doo-Seung Um, Youngoh Lee, Hyunhyub Ko. Transparent and conductive nanomembranes with orthogonal silver nanowire arrays for skin-attachable loudspeakers and microphones. Science Advances, 2018; 4 (8): eaas8772 DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.aas8772

Tiny camera lens may help link quantum computers to network

Kai Wang holding a sample that has multiple metasurface camera lenses.

Credit: Lannon Harley, ANU

An international team of researchers led by The Australian National University (ANU) has invented a tiny camera lens, which may lead to a device that links quantum computers to an optical fibre network.

Quantum computers promise a new era in ultra-secure networks, artificial intelligence and therapeutic drugs, and will be able to solve certain problems much faster than today’s computers.

The unconventional lens, which is 100 times thinner than a human hair, could enable a fast and reliable transfer of quantum information from the new-age computers to a network, once these technologies are fully realised.

The device is made of a silicon film with millions of nano-structures forming a metasurface, which can control light with functionalities outperforming traditional systems.

Associate Professor Andrey Sukhorukov said the metasurface camera lens was highly transparent, thereby enabling efficient transmission and detection of information encoded in quantum light.

“It is the first of its kind to image several quantum particles of light at once, enabling the observation of their spooky behaviour with ultra-sensitive cameras,” said Associate Professor Sukhorukov, who led the research with a team of scientists at the Nonlinear Physics Centre of the ANU Research School of Physics and Engineering.

Kai Wang, a PhD scholar at the Nonlinear Physics Centre who worked on all aspects of the project, said one challenge was making portable quantum technologies.

“Our device offers a compact, integrated and stable solution for manipulating quantum light. It is fabricated with a similar kind of manufacturing technique used by Intel and NVIDIA for computer chips.” he said.

The research was conducted at the Nonlinear Physics Centre laboratories, where staff and postgraduate scholars developed and trialled the metasurface camera lens in collaboration with researchers at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in the United States and the National Central University in Taiwan.

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Story Source:

Materials provided by Australian National University. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.

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Journal Reference:

1. Kai Wang, James G. Titchener, Sergey S. Kruk, Lei Xu, Hung-Pin Chung, Matthew Parry, Ivan I. Kravchenko, Yen-Hung Chen, Alexander S. Solntsev, Yuri S. Kivshar, Dragomir N. Neshev, Andrey A. Sukhorukov. Quantum metasurface for multiphoton interference and state reconstruction. Science, 2018; 361 (6407): 1104-1108 DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.aat8196

New micro-platform reveals cancer cells’ natural behavior

Fluorescence images of pancreatic cancer micro-tumors after overnight culturing. Papillary structures pile up on micro-attachment sites (diameter 30?m), with numerous cells visible per patch. The rightmost micro-tumor has extended over two attachment sites. Nuclei, actin filaments, and microtubules are labeled with blue, green and red fluorescent markers respectively. Credit: Miyatake Y. et al., Scientific Reports, Sept. 19, 2018

A new cell culture platform allows researchers to observe never-before-seen behaviors of live cancer cells under the microscope, leading to explanations of long-known cancer characteristics.

The easy-to-produce platform developed by Hokkaido University researchers offers cancer cells micro-scale attachment sites that elicit never-before-seen behaviors highly relevant to cancer’s clinical properties. The observation of these behaviors shed light on the mechanisms behind well-known properties of pancreatic cancer, one of the most lethal malignant tumors, and may lead to the identification of new treatment targets.

“Cancer studies so far either use cell cultures in which cancer cells don’t necessarily behave naturally, or tissue samples that don’t allow live observation. So there is a big gap in our knowledge of how cancer cells actually behave,” says Assistant Professor Yukiko Miyatake, who led the study and focuses on cancer development mechanisms. To close this gap, she teamed up with Associate Professor Kaori Kuribayashi-Shigetomi who specializes on micro-nano-scale bio-engineering.

Together they created a new cell culture substrate from a coated glass slide with etched islands of 30?m diameter. For healthy cells, this is just enough space for one or two to attach. But when the researchers seeded them with pancreatic cancer cells (although they also tried other cancer cells with similar results) and incubated them overnight, the cells self-organized into micro-tumors that could move in a concerted way, as if it were one organism. Precursors to this turned out to be papillary structures that accommodate 4 or more cells by cell-in-cell invasion. This process, called entosis, is so far known only as a step in cell degradation. Here, the incorporated cells remained alive and, to their surprise, the incorporation was reversible.

When they treated the micro-tumors with the widely used anti-cancer agent Nocodazole, the micro-tumor disintegrated, but the now-detached cells survived. Moreover, the researchers observed the micro-tumors “fishing” for surrounding dead cells and ingesting them, in the process releasing chemical markers typical for dead cells. These markers ended up on the cancer cells’ surfaces, presumably masking them and enabling them to evade the immune system’s killer cells.

Striving to reduce the suffering cancer causes, Miyatake says: “I hope this easy and low-cost technique will find widespread adoption. If the discoveries made during these first observations are physiologically or pathologically relevant phenomena, many more new hints may be gleaned for the development of more effective cancer treatment approaches.”

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Story Source:

Materials provided by Hokkaido University. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.

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Journal Reference:

1. Yukiko Miyatake, Kaori Kuribayashi-Shigetomi, Yusuke Ohta, Shunji Ikeshita, Agus Subagyo, Kazuhisa Sueoka, Akira Kakugo, Maho Amano, Toshiyuki Takahashi, Takaharu Okajima, Masanori Kasahara. Visualising the dynamics of live pancreatic microtumours self-organised through cell-in-cell invasion. Scientific Reports, 2018; 8 (1) DOI: 10.1038/s41598-018-32122-w

 

Hokkaido University. “New micro-platform reveals cancer cells’ natural behavior.” ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 19 September 2018. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/09/180919100952.htm>.

Lithium leader S Korea funds 4MWh vanadium trial that targets doubled energy density

Protean/KORID’s V-KOR vanadium redox flow battery (VRFB) stack. Image: Protean Energy.

With a view to creating a mass market design for vanadium flow batteries, Australia’s Protean Energy will deploy a 4MWh battery energy storage project in South Korea that will be researched over eight years of operation.

The ASX-listed company is involved both with vanadium resources as well as creating energy storage systems using vanadium pentoxide electrolyte, producing its own stack technology, V-KOR.

V-KOR ‘stacks’ individual vanadium redox flow battery (VRFB) cells within a main system stack, unlike most vanadium flow battery designs in which the whole system is one large ‘cell’. Protean claims this lowers manufacturing costs and improves battery performance. The company connected its first project to the grid in Australia in August, a 100kWh system in Western Australia.

Protean, via its’ 50%-owned Korean subsidiary, KORID ENERGY, has been awarded AU$3 Million in funding towards a trial 1MW/4MWh system by the Korean Institute of Energy Technology Evaluation and Planning (KETEP).

KETEP’s various areas of research and development include extensive focus on renewables and advancing energy technologies overall including the Energy Storage System (ESS) Technology Development Program.

The award to Protean is part of a wider AU$9 million project in this area.

The institute selected the provider through a competitive process for the project, which is anticipated to run for 96 months. It is hoped the trial will double the energy density of vanadium electrolyte, in turn reducing the physical footprint of Protean’s V-KOR battery.

South Korea is best known as home to some of the world’s biggest lithium battery suppliers including Samsung SDI, LG Chem and SK Innovation but this project aims to develop a mass production VRFB through lowering costs and improving manufacturing processes for Protean’s 25kW V-KOR stack.

Protean said KORID’s commercialisation strategy will include targeting the market for large-scale commercial and industrial (C&I) projects.

South Korean chemical company Chemtros will manufacture and supply electrolytes, while other partners are:

Electrolyte chemistry – UniPlus

Power conditioning equipment – EKOS

System development – H2

Sungkyunkwan University

Read Long Time Coming, a feature article published across two quarterly editions of PV Tech Power, looking at the tech, the ambitions and strategies of four flow battery makers, here on the site, or download it as a free PDF from ‘Resources’ to keep and carry (subscription details required).

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