Nov 01, 2012

Taiwan: Success Of Taiwanese Research Institute


Taiwan’s Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) became the second-biggest winner at the 2012 R&D 100 Award

Below is an article published by FOCUS TAIWAN:

 

Taiwan's Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) emerged as the second-biggest winner at the 2012 R&D 100 Award presentations in Florida Wednesday, with six award-winning products.

It is the fifth consecutive year in which the Hsinchu-based ITRI has brought home awards from the event. The winners of what are dubbed the "Oscars of innovation" were announced in June.

Among the other winners of the 50th R&D 100 Award were Intel, the MIT Lincoln Laboratory and the NASA Glenn Research Center.

Energy efficiency and electricity conservation have in recent times been two focuses of the ITRI's research, with the aim of helping local enterprises to make better use of resources and generate more profits, said Liang Pei-fang, a director at the institute's Green Energy and Environment Research Laboratories.

The six products included the "SideLighter," a technology that can be used in the windows of high-rise buildings, building materials, roofing materials and solar power plants, as part of a push to create more "green" buildings.

"SideLighter" can lower the costs of establishing solar-power systems and can increase sunlight collection time by improving light transmission of power panels, according to Liang. An ITRI statement said the technology is already being mass-produced.

Another award-winning product, the "AVA-Clamp," is a low-cost, easy-to-use clamp-on voltage and current meter technology that measures the amount of power used by a typical household or commercial appliance such as a microwave, television or industrial machine.

It is a convenient way to monitor and manage energy and can allow users to save up to 10 percent on their electricity use, according to the ITRI.

The ITRI was also awarded for its "Light&Light," the world's first all-plastic, lightweight and unbreakable LED bulb.

Its use of thermal-conductive plastic instead of traditional metal for cooling, along with a special design that expands the cooling area and further improves the heat-dissipation problem, gives extended bulb life and outperforms typical LED bulbs.

The other three award-winning ITRI technological products were "TEMM", a thermoelectric material and module technology, "aePLASMA", an atmospheric environment plasma coating technology, and "Lignoxy", a lignin-based polymer technology.

The TEMM recycles waste industrial heat at temperatures ranging from 100 to 300 degrees Celsius (212 to 572 degrees Fahrenheit) to produce electricity.

"aePLASM" solves the opto-electronics industry's challenge of balancing environmental-protection and cost issues to produce metal-oxide coatings.

It works in the atmospheric environment -- atmospheric pressure and temperature conditions -- by using air with metal ions in an aqueous solution to make a transparent conductive film coating within a few minutes.

Finally, "Lignoxy" technology replaces petroleum-based plastics with a bio-based alternative, making it possible to manufacture coatings free of the Bisphenol-A hormones, in particular those used in food packaging and plastic products such as canned-food containers and plastic utensils.