Distillation involves heating a liquid until it boils, then condensing and collecting the vapors that come off the liquid. When distilling ethanol, the process is fundamentally limited such that the maximum concentration of alcohol is around 95-percent. A new method has been developed whereby gold-silica nanoparticles are added to the liquid and it is illuminated from above. The photons are either absorbed by the nanoparticles and the particles heat up, or they scatter and strike other nanoparticles. This causes local heating near the liquid surface, which drives off the volatile, such as ethanol. With this method, ethanol concentrations can reach 99-percent.
And could light be used to distil hooch? 'We've joked about this in the lab,' says Halas. 'But rather than moonshine it would of course have to be called sunshine!'
(Score: 5, Informative) by MrGuy on Monday November 30 2015, @09:11PM
Any method of distillation involving heating should be fundamentally limited by the fact that a ~95% ethanol ~5% water mixture is azeotropic [wikipedia.org], which means that the two components of the mixture boil at the same temperature (i.e. the vapor pressure of the ethanol in the solution and the vapor pressure of the water in the solution are equal at the boiling point). Adding heat alone (regardless of how) shouldn't be able to separate the components of the solution (ethanol and water) by distillation.
There are methods [wikipedia.org] to separate azetropes, most of which involve adding a third chemical to the solution to alter the relative proportions of the two components we're trying to isolate.
I'm not saying there isn't a way to use nanoparticles to separate an azetropic mixture. Just that simple heating doesn't seem to be a plausible mechanism.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by bob_super on Monday November 30 2015, @09:22PM
My problem with it is simpler and less scientific: Why?
Do you really want 99% ethanol instead of 95%? What on earth would it taste like?
What's the point, beyond being a competitor with raw Ghost peppers for "stupidest dare on YouTube"?
(Score: 2) by M. Baranczak on Monday November 30 2015, @09:32PM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 30 2015, @09:42PM
It is better to purify alcohol as much as possible and then dissolve it.
(Score: 4, Informative) by gman003 on Monday November 30 2015, @09:53PM
Industrial use. I imagine many chemical reactions would appreciate the decreased water content. I can even see it being used in rocketry - ethanol isn't a popular fuel these days, but water contamination of it was always a problem back when it was in use. And if it can apply to other mixtures, it can have very wide use.
(Score: 1) by PocketSizeSUn on Monday November 30 2015, @09:56PM
Starting with 4% less yuck should lead to a superior vodka. Which is by definition pure [as possible] ethanol diluted to 40%.
After all the idea is to get rid of as much of the 'bad' as possible then filtering through through various forms of activated carbon for flavor.
After that you can flavor the alcohol however you like. For example and your fine mix of juniper berries, herbs and other botanical flavors and you can also get fine Gin.
That 95% grain alcohol is a by-product of building distilleries capable of getting the alcohol strength high enough for blending with petrol. It's dirt cheap cause it doesn't have all the finishing steps to turn it into something palatable (even after you dilute it back to something sane).
Of course you can hide anything with enough sugar so kids like to mix it with kool-aid and get wasted for cheap.
(Score: 5, Informative) by Post-Nihilist on Monday November 30 2015, @09:59PM
To dissolve something really hydrophobic (to clean rosin off a pcb for example) you need anhydrous alcohol. Anhydrous isopropanol is commonly use, to avoid regulatory issues and its longer carbons chain confers it less hydrophilicity
Be like us, be different, be a nihilist!!!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 01 2015, @01:12AM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 01 2015, @07:11AM
Funny thing is they already produce anhydrous ethanol by other means. The usual method is to add other solvents that can deal with the water still remaining. Not sure I'd want to drink it, though. Everclear is bad enough at ~90-95% ABV.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 01 2015, @07:34PM
Biodiesel would be one application where 95% versus 99% impacts yields and the 99% would likely make glycerine separation easier as there would be less soaps.
The above of course assumes that your oil feedstock is also very dry.
(Score: 1) by Post-Nihilist on Tuesday December 01 2015, @11:13PM
You can already produce anydhrous EtOH by using desiccants to remove the remaining 4.4% of water. Depending on the desired purity you can use something as crude as saw dust or as fancy as synthetic microporous aluminosilicate. Cost is probably the reason why it is not in use already...
Be like us, be different, be a nihilist!!!
(Score: 2) by wonkey_monkey on Monday November 30 2015, @09:32PM
It seems likely that the highly localised heating on the surface of nanoparticles somehow disrupts hydrogen bonding within the ethanol–water mixture, allowing greater separation of ethanol from water molecules at higher concentrations of ethanol.
Smell better?
It sounds like it wasn't even their primary intention to improve purity, but just to make the heating more efficient.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 30 2015, @09:54PM
If that's the case then microwaves heat water very efficiently because the frequency resonates with water molecules. Optimize the frequency to resonate with whatever it is you are heating and you can heat it very efficiently too. Why add something into the container, radiate it with something that resonates with the frequency of whatever it is you added, and have it transfer the heat into the solution you want to heat when you can simply use frequency waves that resonate with whatever it is you are heating.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 30 2015, @10:09PM
Uhm ... a bit off topic but I wonder if radiation therapy uses radiation frequencies that resonate with cancer cells and not other types of cells. Granted heated cancer cells could damage surrounding tissue (perhaps if you can place something cold around the surrounding tissue to cool it depending on the nature and location of the cancer) but I wonder if it's possible to evaluate the structure of someone's cancer cells to determine a frequency that will heat the cancer cells without affecting the other cells in your body and to use that to radiate the cancer. Perhaps the optimal frequency to use varies from person to person. Maybe they can get a sample of some cancer cells and try to blast it with low intensities of differing frequencies and see which one will alter the temperature of the cells the most (they can use an IR temperature reader or IR vision to see the temperature and how it changes with time). Find a frequency that changes the temperature of the cancer cells the most in the least time when compared to normal cells.
An issue with that is that perhaps different normal body tissues resonate at different frequencies so perhaps if it's a systemic cancer the optimal frequency to use may only be applicable to certain parts of the body and they may have to figure out how to avoid other parts that maybe sensitive to that frequency and figure out a better way to remove cancer from those body parts if it's a malignant cancer that spread. Or use a different frequency for certain body parts that can heat the cancer cell less efficiently than the optimal resonance frequency but has an even lesser impact on the normal cells.
(Score: 2) by DECbot on Monday November 30 2015, @10:22PM
I believe this has been done with some useful results... You'd take a drug that binds only to the receptors on the cancer cells, and then you would be locally radiated by a frequency that resonates the drug.
This is from 2008, didn't find anything quickly as follow up... [nih.gov]
cats~$ sudo chown -R us /home/base
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 01 2015, @09:52AM
See also: http://the-institute.com.au/about-radiowave-therapy/kanzius-therapy-and-radiowave-therapy/ [the-institute.com.au]
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 01 2015, @04:01AM
Microwave ovens do not heat water by any kind of natural resonance. They work on water because water molecules are polar molecules: they are electrically asymmetric (a negative ion on one side bound to two positive ions on the other). These molecules will tend to move in the presence of an electromagnetic field. A microwave oven produces an electromagnetic field which is constantly changing, causing the polar water molecules to vibrate, which results in heat.
It will work at essentially any frequency. 2.45GHz was mainly chosen to avoid interference with existing radio communication systems.
(Score: 2) by wonkey_monkey on Tuesday December 01 2015, @09:21AM
Because the whole point is to heat a specific part of the liquid (the surface), not the whole thing.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 30 2015, @09:33PM
You're not saying it, but the article is. They claim to get 99% ethanol "routinely".
(Score: 2) by Zinho on Monday November 30 2015, @09:46PM
You're looking at the wrong half of the process.
The beaker being distilled from can have a much higher water concentration, as long as the alcohol is being selectively removed. In fact, the expected result is that you would approach 100% water in the source vessel.
The place you extract 99% pure alcohol is after the condenser coil where vaporized alcohol is converted back to liquid. You're probably only at 99% because some fraction of water vapor from the air is going to contaminate the distilled result; if the vapor is 100% (or close to it) alcohol then the condensed distillate will be nearly 100% pure alcohol.
"Space Exploration is not endless circles in low earth orbit." -Buzz Aldrin
(Score: 2) by Covalent on Tuesday December 01 2015, @01:20AM
95% alcohol / 5% water is azeotropic...in bulk. I think the magic sauce here is that at the surface of the particles you're creating a different environment where this is no longer the case.
You can't rationally argue somebody out of a position they didn't rationally get into.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 01 2015, @02:33AM
This development is not emerging out of thin air.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25065948 [nih.gov]
http://www.hypersolar.com/technology.php [hypersolar.com]
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/12/131215160904.htm [sciencedaily.com]
(Score: 2) by captain normal on Tuesday December 01 2015, @04:30AM
Why mess with something the Scottish figured out around 700 years ago?
Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not to his own facts"- --Daniel Patrick Moynihan--
(Score: 2) by Taibhsear on Monday November 30 2015, @09:11PM
Article title should be "Distillation using light instead of fire or electrodes."
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 30 2015, @09:40PM
Yes, and don't forget "inductive elements". And "radio-isotopic decay". And "non-adiabatic compression". And "steam jacketed vessel". The article title would be SO much better served if we included EVERY damn way to heat a liquid. Oh yeah, superheated rocks [germanbeerinstitute.com].
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 30 2015, @09:14PM
How long will it take? And how you gonna mix peat into the ceremony?
(Score: 4, Funny) by Runaway1956 on Monday November 30 2015, @10:16PM
Forget about Pete. He got fired because he didn't know Scotch whiskey from turpentine. I hear they're looking for some new help at Islay's.
(Score: 2) by Snotnose on Monday November 30 2015, @10:15PM
I remember when we covered fractional distillation in 10th grade chem. First thing my bud and I did was buy a bottle of vodka, get out our chemistry sets, drive off the evil water, and put what was left in airline drink bottles. Take em to school, add em to a can of coke, and the school day went by much better.
Of course this was the 70s, where the penalty for getting caught were much milder than they are today (they'd probably close the school and call in SWAT today).
When the dust settled America realized it was saved by a porn star.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday December 01 2015, @03:51AM
For booze? Nah. Now if you point your finger at someone like a gun, SWAT and full lockdown.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.