Engineers win innovator prize
Friday, 21 December 2012
Manager of Research Commercialisation, Mr Roger Plumb with award recipients Associate Professor Laichang Zhang and Ms Jing Miao and Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research and Advancement) Professor John Finlay-Jones
Congratulations to Associate Professor Laichang Zhang and Ms Jing Miao who won the ECU Innovator Prize of the year award at the recent Celebrating Success 2012 event.
The School of Engineering researchers were awarded the prize for their research into novel poly vinyl alcohol (PVA), membranes for reverse osmosis and nano-filtration.
PVA membranes have great potential for use in desalination and wastewater treatment plants due to their chemical characteristics as they allow the water to pass through the membrane easily but prevent the salt from passing through. The PVA membranes are also low cost.
This funding will be used to explore the membrane’s properties and their impact on the environment. Solving these issues will mean the materials will improve the performance of industrial-scale plants.
The prize funding will be used to purchase membrane evaluation equipment and further characterise composite membranes, as well as potentially patenting findings before publishing.