nCoat Inc., an emerging nanotechnology company in the high-performance coatings market, recently announced that one of its nano-structured coatings has won the Utah Innovations Award in the Chemicals/Materials Science category of the fourth annual Stoel Utah Innovations Awards competition.
The winning nCoat nanotechnology-based coating is specially designed to protect materials requiring a high level of heat resistance (thermal barrier). The nCoat coating has been tested and used for use on space vehicles to create thermal barriers upon re-entry. nCoat's nano-coating has been tested to withstand temperatures in excess of 4,200 degrees Fahrenheit for sustained durations.
"We express our gratitude to the selection board of the Stoel Rives Innovation Award for their consideration and selection of our nano-structured coating," said Paul Clayson, nCoat's co-founder, chief executive officer and chairman of the board. "We are honored by this recognition, and recognize the nCoat team of engineers, chemists and applicators for their superior work in producing an outstanding product. The commercial prospects are huge and apply across multiple markets. This team has created a world-class product."
nCoat began developing this specific nano-coating for an aerospace customer in early 2004. Based upon research notes, nCoat's new "nano-slurry" coatings provided:
1. Heat resistance at levels more than double any previously tested coating;
2. Tensile strength of the new nano-enhanced composite is higher than the current production metallic base material;
3. The flexibility of the coating as documented in bend tests was greater than any other tested coating;
4. Resistance to highly concentrated corrosive material was far beyond previously tested coatings (as measured in multiple corrosivity tests);
5. Total weight of the new nano-enhanced composite was less than half the weight of the production metallic materials;
6. The dispersion of the "nano-slurry" coating infiltrated the layers of composite fabric fully, creating an exceptionally high-density, low-porosity finished composite material that far outperformed any previously structured composite; and
7. The ability of the coating to bind the nano-particulates in the slurry and to bind the slurry to the substrate materials was exceptional, lessening the risk of long-term delamination of the composite.
Historically, the high-performance coatings industry has created products that use particulates at a micron measurement scale or larger - one-millionth of a meter, 10(-6), or 0.000001 - with binding chemistry. Such coatings have traditionally been used to provide improved functionality and new properties to the coated product, such as adding a non-stick surface to a frying pan or improving the lifespan of numerous parts of a combustion engine.
nCoat's new nanoscale and traditional micro- and macro-formulated coatings make it an international leader in the development and marketing of coatings that are applied to metal, ceramics, fabric and other materials. nCoat has multiple unique nanoscale-, micro- and macro-formulated coatings structured to meet the exacting needs of customers in more than a dozen industries. The benefits of these coatings typically fall within one or more of the following five categories: heat management, corrosion resistance, abrasion resistance, friction reduction and improved appearance.
Seven Utah Innovations Award winners - one each from seven categories - were announced at an awards lunch on May 17 at the Sheraton City Centre in
Votes were tallied by the accounting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers. More details about the awards program are available at www.stoel.com/innovation.
