R&D 100 Winner's Highly Anticipated Product Launch Helps to Make World Cleaner Using Nanotechnology

MCALLEN, Texas, Oct. 25, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- FibeRio Technology Corporation, winner of this year's prestigious R&D 100 Award, announced that industrial-scale equipment models will be launched at the Filtration 2011 trade show, which will finally enable the mass use of nanofibers in air and water filters. Previously, filters could only capture about 80% of dangerous particles that were .5 microns or smaller (100 times smaller than a hair). Nanofibers can be used to make filters that capture up to 99% of these particles making the air we breathe and the water we drink cleaner and safer. However, nanofibers have been so expensive to make that they are rarely used. FibeRio's equipment uses a new technology called Forcespinning™ to make massive amounts of nanofiber at one quarter of the cost of older technologies, which will enable filtration companies to use nanofibers in a broader range of air and water filtration products.

Previously, the only commercial method for making nanofibers required unacceptable amounts of environmentally harmful solvents, which negated the positive impact nanofibers could have on the environment through cleaner air and water. This other technique was very expensive, and production rates were very slow. Forcespinning™ reduces or eliminates the use of solvents and requires very little energy, making it the most Green process available for nanofiber production. Over the past year, FibeRio has received multiple awards for this advancement including a Silver Medal at the World's Best Technology Showcase, 2010 Innovation That Will Change the Way You Manufacture by the Society of Manufacturing Engineers, and most recently the R&D 100 by R&D Magazine. In November, the company will launch its first production level nanofiber system, the Cyclone Fiber Engine 1.1.

"Forcespinning™ technology and the Cyclone FE 1.1 system are a significant advancement in enabling filtration companies to provide the next generation of filters to create cleaner air and liquids," says FibeRio CEO Ellery Buchanan. He goes on to say that "the dramatic increase in productivity and the elimination of toxic solvents at the industrial scale with the Cyclone FE 1.1 help FibeRio to fulfill its mission of improving our environment through the unlimited availability of nanofibers."

Nanofibers are much smaller than a human hair and can be used to create a mesh at the surface of a filter that is impossible for small particles to penetrate. It has long been understood that nanofibers also induce an effect termed "slip-flow" at the surface of the fiber, which make the filters more efficient while still allowing air to flow past them. This effect cannot be achieved with traditional fiber sizes.

"It has been known for some time that nanofibers enable filters to reach a much higher level of filter efficiency without blocking the air that you want to flow past," says Buchanan. "The only problem was that they were very challenging and expensive to make, but now the industrial scale systems from FibeRio will change that."

FibeRio Technology Corporation provides the technology and capital equipment to transform the materials market through the unlimited availability of nanofibers. The company is headquartered in its manufacturing facility in McAllen, TX. For more information, please visit www.fiberiotech.com or call 956-207-5448.

SOURCE FibeRio Technology Corporation