Acetaldehyde accounts for most of the gaseous substances in cigarette smoke. “In cooperation with KT&G, KIST has developed a nano-catalyst filter coated with a manganese oxide-based nano-catalyst, which can be used in a smoking room to reduce and purify major harmful substances of cigarette smoke. The KIST-developed catalyst removes 100% of the particle substances of cigarette smoke, such as nicotine and tar, converting those into water vapor and carbon dioxide. According to the research team, the air cleaning equipment based on the newly-developed catalyst can purify over 80% of the cigarette smoke within 30 minutes and 100% of it within 1 hour in a 30 square meter smoking room, where 10 people are simultaneously smoking” said Dr. Jongsoo Jurng and Dr. Gwi-Nam at KIST
>> Activated charcoal-based filters have been mostly used in a smoking room to remove gaseous materials in cigarette smoke. However, those filters are not effective in removing gaseous materials such as acetaldehyde, their absorption performance decreases fast in a closed facility such as a smoking room, and they need to be replaced at least every other week, which is rather inconvenient.
METHOD: they developed a nano-catalyst filter by evenly coating a manganese oxide-based (Mn/ TiO2) nano-catalyst powder onto a ceramic-based filter media. The nano-catalyst filter uses a technology that decomposes elements of cigarette smoke using oxygen radical, which is generated by decomposing ozone in the air on the surface of the manganese-oxide-based nano-catalyst filter. A test with total volatile organic compounds (TVOC), such as acetaldehyde, nicotine and tar, which account for the largest volume of gaseous materials in cigarette smoke, is conducted to evaluate performance. It decomposes >98% of the harmful substances
For the performance evaluation test, they made an air cleaning equipment prototype and installed in an actual smoking room 30 sq meters (with processing capacity of 4 CMM).The test condition was designed based on the processing capacity which could circulate the air inside the entire 30 square meter smoking room once every 15 minutes.
It will take a year or so to commercialize this technology as the nano-catalyst and the filter coating technologies had been developed already. Besides clean air, it “can be integrated with other air cleaning products such as air purifiers and air conditioners.”
http://eng.kist.re.kr/kist_eng/?sub_num=417&state=view&idx=1179
The performance of the newly developed catalyst (Mn/TiO2) was evaluated using testing devices at the research lab. The decomposition performance was 98% at maximum in the range from low concentration (10ppm) to high concentration (200ppm). Ozone, which was used for processing reaction, was not discharged or detected after the decomposition reaction as it was completely decomposed by the catalyst
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