Membranes

Canada-based Evercloak's HVAC technology recently received a funding boost, with CAD$1.1 million (over USD$807,000) in funding from Natural Resources Canada's Energy Innovation Program (EIP).

The EIP funding supports a $1.8M project enabling Evercloak to accelerate the development of their membrane-based system, which can cut the energy required for air conditioning and dehumidification by up to 50%. According to the Company's founder and CEO, Evelyn Allen, those reductions will be crucial as global temperatures rise.

Australia-based NematiQ has announced that after more than a decade of work, the NematiQ Graphene Oxide membrane has obtained WaterMark certification, solidifying its status as a safe product for water filtration. 

The Australian WaterMark Certification Scheme is a mandatory scheme for plumbing and drainage products of a certain type. Certification ensures products are fit for purpose and appropriately authorized for use in plumbing and drainage installations. The Australian Building Codes Board administers and manages the Scheme.

Researchers at École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) have developed advanced graphene membranes with pyridinic-nitrogen at pore edges, reportedly showing unprecedented performance in CO₂ capture. This could mark a step towards more efficient carbon capture technologies.

Carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS) is a technology that reduces carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions from hard-to-abate industrial sources such as power plants, cement factories, steel mills, and waste incinerators. But current capture methods rely on energy-intensive processes, which makes them costly and unsustainable. Researchers are working to develop membranes that can selectively capture CO₂ with high efficiency, thereby reducing the energy and financial costs associated with CCUS. But even state-of-the-art membranes, such as polymer thin films, are limited in terms of CO₂ permeance and selectivity, which limits their scalability. So, the challenge is to create membranes that can simultaneously offer high CO₂ permeance and selectivity, crucial for effective carbon capture.

The EU-funded MEGAMORPH project, which started in 2022, demonstrated its graphene-based display technology at Displayweek 2024.

The idea behind the project is to use CVD graphene sheets (produced by Graphenea, a partner in the project) as the semi-transparent membranes in a Interferometric Modulator Display. These kinds of displays use mechanical micro-mirrors as pixels that modulate the ambient light without using power to generate light. IMOD displays are promising as they can offer very low power operation and high density displays.

Canada-based Evercloak, that aims to turn the theoretical potential of membrane-based dehumidification into a viable commercial option with its method of manufacturing graphene composite membranes at scale, has announced that it has raised CAD$2 Million (around USD$1,475,000) in an oversubscribed seed round of investment, driven by interest in its HVAC technology. 

By reducing the amount of electricity required to dehumidify air — the most energy-intensive part of cooling — Evercloak’s membrane-based solution can cut the energy demands of air conditioning in half.

Researchers from Germany's Max Planck Institute for Polymer Research and China's Southeast University have reported a graphene-based aqueous memristive device with long-term and tunable memory, regulated by reversible voltage-induced interfacial acid-base equilibria enabled by selective proton permeation through the graphene. 

Memristive devices, electrical elements whose resistance depends on the history of applied electrical signals, are leading candidates for future data storage and neuromorphic computing. Memristive devices typically rely on solid-state technology, while aqueous memristive devices are crucial for biology-related applications such as next-generation brain-machine interfaces. Recently, nanofluidic devices have been reported in which solvated ion transport exhibits memristive behavior. The challenge associated with these approaches is the complexity of the device fabrication. Realizing memristive behavior in a simple system is highly desirable.

Ora Graphene, producer of free-standing graphene membranes, announced a partnership with Taiwan-based Merry Electronics to develop off-the-shelf GrapheneQ headphone drivers. These, according to Ora, will be the world's first commercially available graphene-based drivers. The two companies will offer 40 mm and 50 mm drivers, which will be available for pre-order in Q1 2024.

Ora Graphene says that it already integrated its technology into flagship products for two major consumer electronics companies - both of these premium gaming headphones. The availability of off-the-shelf headphone drivers will hopefully accelerate the adoption of Ora's technology.

Logitech G, a brand of Logitech and leading innovator of gaming technologies and gear, has unveiled the Logitech G ASTRO A50 X LIGHTSPEED Wireless Gaming Headset and Base Station, the fifth generation of the ASTRO A50 Series console gaming headset. 

The new ASTRO A5O X is designed to deliver the ultimate console headset experience and will include (among other technological innovations), the PRO-G Graphene Audio Driver technology for high performance gaming audio.

The GIANCE research project officially commenced on October 1st, marking a step toward addressing environmental challenges with innovative solutions.

GIANCE is an ambitious initiative that seeks to establish a holistic, integrated and industry-driven platform with a clear focus on improving sustainable materials and their real-world applications. This project is dedicated to designing, developing and scaling up the next generation of cost-effective, sustainable, lightweight and recyclable graphene and related materials (GRM)-based multifunctional composites, coatings, foams and membranes (GRM-bM).

Researchers from Peking University, Beijing Normal University and KU Leuven recently reported a novel method to substantially reinforce large-area graphene membranes. Their work provides a facile method to fabricate large-area graphene membranes and paves the road to practical application in the membrane separation field. 

Nanoporous graphene membranes are attractive for molecular separations, but it remains challenging to maintain sufficient mechanical strength during scalable fabrication and module development. In this work, the team drew inspiration from the composite structure of cell membranes and cell walls, and designed a large-area atomically thin nanoporous graphene membrane supported by a fiber-reinforced structure with strong interlamellar adhesion. It was found that factors like fracture stress, fracture strength, and tensile stiffness of the composite membranes can be enhanced compared with other graphene-based membranes of large scale.