Feb 9 2010
Borealis Exploration Limited (PINKSHEETS: BOREF) has received a U.S. patent for its Avto Metals Technology covering multiple applications in several industrial and scientific fields. The patent describes how Avto Metals™ can be used in fields including sensors, catalytic converters, catalysts, herbicides, pesticides, and for many antiviral, antibacterial, and antifungal applications.
Borealis is a technology company primarily developing improved technologies for serial hybrid vehicles, green aviation, Chorus® motors, electrical power generation, cooling and refrigeration through subsidiary companies. The potential uses of its basic scientific research in the medical, catalytic, industrial and agricultural fields have not been previously disclosed.
The patent, titled "Catalysts," US 7,651,875, was issued by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office on January 26. It covers some of the many potential applications of the company's Avto Metals technology, which enables the electrical properties of a metal to be altered as desired in nanoscale and thus can change the metal's chemical or electrical properties and behavior.
Medical and Agricultural Applications
The technology offers a new method for catalyzing a chemical reaction or for causing a biocatalyst reaction, for example, and thus for treating diseased humans or animals. It can be used to increase or reduce the biological activity of enzymes, antibodies, receptors and proteins, and as a mechanism for specific delivery of pharmaceuticals. The Avto Metals technology can also be used as the basis for a carrier to deliver pesticides or herbicides to kill a pest of an animal or plant, or to attach biomolecules for delivery of chemicals or drugs.
The patent provides examples of such applications. "Where the therapeutic target is a cancer cell, an antibody, for example, may serve to effectively cover the surface of the cancer cell with the nanoparticulate form of the invention. The properties of the surface of the invention are such as to result in the death of a cell so covered." The Avto Metals technology also could increase the activity of a therapeutic agent through its association with the nano-structured surface of an Avto Metal, which also could cause an ineffective drug candidate to become effective.
Improved Sensors
The Avto technology also can be used as a sensor for many industrial or homeland security applications, by detecting small electrical changes caused by motion, or as a biosensor, to detect the presence of a particular material. It can be used to detect contamination in water, for example, or to detect the presence of dangerous biological or chemical elements. Such a device would be useful on commercial aircraft, for example, which are ideally suited for wide distribution of pathogens.
Devices based on the technology could be used to detect a specific microbe or a small change in the chemical environment, either inside a human or animal or in the general environment. It can be used in either stationary or portable detectors of chemical and biological weapons.
Better Catalytic Converters for Cars
The technology can also enable improved catalytic analysis and activity, such as for catalytic converters in automobiles. Current automobiles use two different types of catalyst, a reduction catalyst and an oxidization catalyst; both could be replaced by a single catalyst based on the Avto Metals technology.