Items Tagged With Environment

The III Hispano-French Conference on micro and nanotechnologies was held recently in Donostia-San Sebastián, one of the participants being AZTI-Tecnalia which presented part of its research carried out within the framework of the European GOODFOOD—Food Safety and Quality Monitoring with Microsystems programme.

Syrris, a UK developer of tools and technologies for R&D chemists, has announced the formation of a subsidiary company, The Dolomite Centre Limited (Dolomite), the first Microfluidic Application Centre in the world. With a grant of £2 million from the UK’s Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), Dolomite will use its funding and technical expertise to design and build microfluidic devices and instrumentation, either to meet a client’s specification or to develop an entire instrumentation and device solution from scratch. Such technology can offer improved reproducibility, faster performance and lower reagent consumption across a broad range of applications including, environmental monitoring, clinical diagnostics, food and beverage, cosmetics, and pharmaceuticals and chemicals.

BASF has opened its first research centre for nanotechnology in Asia. The new centre in Singapore involves a €13 million expenditure up to 2008, and will employ 20 staff, mainly scientists and technicians. BASF already operates 17 development sites in Asia Pacific, but this is the first time the company is carrying out research dedicated only to nanotechnology in the region.

BASF Venture Capital GmbH, Ludwigshafen, is investing in Pangaea Ventures Fund II, LP, a venture capital fund belonging to Pangaea Ventures Ltd of Vancouver, Canada. Pangaea Ventures invests in early-stage advanced materials, energy and environmental technologies as well as nanotechnology companies in North America.

Argonne National Laboratory scientists in collaboration with Xradia have created a new X-ray microscope technique capable of observing molecular-scale features, measuring less than a nanometre in height. Combining X-ray reflection together with high resolution X-ray microscopy, scientists can now study interactions at the nanometre-scale which often can exhibit different properties and lead to new insights. Improving our understanding of interactions at the nanoscale holds promise to help us cure the sick, protect our environment and make us more secure.