Dump the cat litter scoopers; U-M students create technology to separate oil from water

The answer to cleaning up the Gulf Oil spill from last summer could be in the development process at the University of Michigan. Or at least that's what a trio of its graduate students think.

Anish Tuteja, Arun Kota, and Gibum Kwon have developed a filter membrane that promises to catch toxicities like oil while letting water pass through. The trio are working with the university's Office of Tech Transfer to commercialize the new technology and recently had it on display at U-M's 10th annual Celebrate Invention event.

What makes the new technology unique is that it filters out pollutants like oil or industrial waste. This way clean up crews can spray the new polymer onto a filter-like device, like a coffee filter, and use it to gather oil in large bodies of water. Most other similar applications work the other way around.

"It should be very easy to scale up," says Tuteja, an assistant professor of material science and engineering at U-M.

The group is working to publish a scientific paper on the new technology and license it out in the hopes of bringing it to market within 3-5 years.

Source: Anish Tuteja, assistant professor of material science and engineering at the University of Michigan
Writer: Jon Zemke

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