This is seriously important as it can make subsea operations
completely viable. We can add in a wet suit lined with an oxygen
rich gel as well and long term operations become viable. The skin
itself would continue to breathe allowing hours of work to be
undertaken.
Thus subsea infrastructure can be built with housing for a long term
presence only attempted sketchily at the moment.
In short I now see a viable development road with known solutions and
the subsea can be easily opened up. It is not a priority so
development will be slow and methodical but then I know that as I was
involved with following subsea technology development from early
days forty years ago.
This will be important for spacecsuits as well.
New Crystal Could
Let Divers Breathe Underwater
OCT 2, 2014 05:30 PM
ET // BY PAUL HELTZEL
Scuba diving is great
fun until your tank starts running out of oxygen. But what if you
could just gather the oxygen from the water that's all around you on
a dive? A new material synthesized by researchers in a lab could do
just that.
Scientists have
created a crystalline material that can pull all the oxygen out of
room with just a spoonful. And it can release that oxygen when and
where it's needed. What some have dubbed the Aquaman crystal offers
tantalizing promise for those tethered to bulky equipment.
"This could be
valuable for lung patients who today must carry heavy oxygen tanks
with them," said professor Christine McKenzie of the University
of Southern Denmark, in a statement. "But also divers may one
day be able to leave the oxygen tanks at home and instead get oxygen
from this material as it "filters" and concentrates oxygen
from surrounding air or water. A few grains contain enough oxygen for
one breath, and as the material can absorb oxygen from the water
around the diver and supply the diver with it, the diver will not
need to bring more than these few grains."
The new material uses
the element cobalt, bound in an organic molecule.
"Cobalt gives the
new material precisely the molecular and electronic structure that
enables it to absorb oxygen from its surroundings," McKenzie
said. "Small amounts of metals are essential for the absorption
of oxygen, so actually it is not entirely surprising to see this
effect in our new material," she said.
The material, like a
sponge, can absorb oxygen and release it many times over. Once the
oxygen is absorbed it can be released with a small amount of heat or
by exposing it to low oxygen pressure, like a vacuum. The researchers
are also investigating whether the oyxgen release could be triggered
by light.
"When the
substance is saturated with oxygen, it can be compared to an oxygen
tank containing pure oxygen under pressure -- the difference is that
this material can hold three times as much oxygen," McKenzie
said.
2 comments:
"When the substance is saturated with oxygen, it can be compared to an oxygen tank containing pure oxygen under pressure..."
This would creat a problem for underwater applications. Divers air mixtures are usually largely nitrogen with only a small amount of oxygen. This is because excessive oxygen at increasing pressures can very quickly lead to serious health risks due to gas/liquid saturation. At depths greater than 200ft the nitrogen too, starts becoming toxic and helium mixtures must be used. Using an air tank with 100% oxygen can cause things like seizures and retinal detatchment only 20 feet under water.
This will be a long research endeavor to make suits from this material.
Pipe dream... Divers dont breathe just oxygen. We breathe air... Our tanks MAY be augmented with oxygen or nitrogen. Depending on the depth and time under water.
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