Breakthrough: Researchers make plasma without high-voltage electricity

Researchers have come up with a way to make plasma without high-voltage electricity which could lead to new applications in pollution control, medicine and other areas, the U.S. National Science Foundation said.

The new process uses piezoelectric crystals to produce electricity, according to the study which the Science Foundation helped fund, according to a press release from the National Science Foundation.

The crystals “directly transform mechanical energy into electrical energy,” the study said.

Instead of high-voltage electricity, researchers were able to use a hand crank to generate plasma.

 “This work shows the potential of generating plasma in off-the-grid situations using piezoelectric crystals,” the foundation said in the press release.

One example would be using plasma to reduce pollution in cars and other machinery or for medical devices in disaster areas that are suffering from power outages, according to the study.

“Low-temperature plasmas offer promise for applications in medicine, water purification, agriculture, pollutant removal, nanomaterial synthesis and more,” the National Science Foundation said in the press release. “Yet making these plasmas by conventional methods takes several thousand volts of electricity. That limits their use outside high-voltage power settings.”

Compressing piezoelectric crystal “generates a surface voltage high enough to initiate a plasma,” the foundation said in the press release.

There are caveats to the findings, researchers said.

A hand-cranked device might only be be adequate for small projects such as purifying small amounts of water, the study said, but is “not realistic for the longer times needed to achieve the same outcomes as conventional high-voltage power supply-based systems,” the study said.

But the research illustrates the “inherent promise” of the system, scientists said.

They are conducting further research on capturing waste energy from mechanical systems such as engines to power the plasma generators.

“Energy-conversion plasmas could make the combustion process in cars, airplanes and cruise ships more fuel efficient,” the National Science Foundation said in the press release.

In addition the pollution control and medicine, plasmas have potential uses in other fields such as water treatment and agriculture, researchers said.

Many of these are conducted outside, away from high-voltage power supplies.

“Developing new approaches to generate these discharges could be very impactful,” the study said.