Tom Shelley reports on an animal inspired way to
greatly improve the efficiency of construction equipment and
agricultural ploughs
By passing small electric currents between electrodes on a
surface, it is possible to attract water lubrication to points
which most need it, and reduce resistance to passage for
bulldozing blades and agricultural ploughs by a very significant
amount.
The discovery has come from a Chinese study of how it is that
earthworms and dung beetles ease their path through the soil.
The amounts of electricity required are microscopic - earthworms
only need to apply a few tens of millivolts, increased to 12V for
machines working on a man made scale.
The discovery is the work of a team of researchers led by
Professor Luquan Ren, Vice President of Jilin University in
Changchun in North Eastern China.
If electricity is passed through soil, water tends to migrate
from positive to negative poles under the action of a surface
double layer effect called electrophoresis or electro-osmosis.
Bioelectricity is found in all living creatures. It is of two
types. There is a resting potential between the inside and
outside of the tissue or cell membrane when the creature is
stationary. When moving, there is an additional action potential
between the excited part and the resting part of the same tissue
or cells. The action potential is of short duration, but larger
than the resting membrane potential.
Surface potentials on the outer skin of an earthworm arise
from the resting and action potentials. In the study in China,
surface potentials on the fore part, middle part and hind parts
of an earthworm were measured using silver-silver chloride
electrodes and silk electrodes. It was found that the resting
potential of the earthworm was zero with respect to earth, but
the skin of the moving part rose to as much as -40mV at the fore
part of the worm with respect to earth and to the rest of the
worm.
In another experiment, a circular silver silver chloride
electrode was prepared and fixed inside a 10mm long tube. The
earthworm was guided through it and it was found that the worm
produced a potential of -35mV at its fore part, -19mV in its
middle part and -18mV at its hind part.
In addition to the generation of voltage between the front and
rear parts of the worm, it has been found that in various animals
which spend much of their time in contact with soil, their skins
are ribbed or rough in some way. In each case, surface elements
which stick out show a small negative voltage relative to areas
in between. The purpose appears to be to cause water to move
towards protuberances in order to lubricate them.
Although the voltage differences are very small, the distances
are also very small, so that voltage gradients are significant.
Water is an extremely good lubricant, as former school students
should remember from having to wet glass tubes in order to slide
on rubber connecting tubes. Electrophoresis is also known to be
the most efficient way of moving fluids on the small scale, and
is generally expected to be key to pumping within the emerging
generation of lab on a chip devices.
Dung beetles are found to use a similar mechanism to earthworms
to help them make their way through soil. It has been concluded
that for maximum effectiveness, it is not only necessary for
voltage to be generated between different parts of the skin
surface, but also that this should be rough. If it rough, water
is encouraged to migrate to relatively small areas where
lubrication is of maximum benefit.
The Chinese team has been quick to see whether the effects
would be useful in larger scale products. Starting with
laboratory scale bulldozing experiments, it was found that under
otherwise identical conditions, soil stuck onto the surface of
smooth or rough plates without electro-osmosis, but little or no
soil stuck to a rough plate with energised electrodes. Dome
topped electrodes in the test plate were made from carbon steel,
placed in holes in the test plate within insulating containments.
Dome tops, which stood slightly proud of the flat plate surface
were energised at -12V relative to the plate. The team reports
the arrangement reduces bulldozing resistance by 15 to 32%.
The team then went onto tests with modified plough mouldboards in the field. It was found that tillage resistance was reduced by 15 to 18%, and fuel consumption reduced by 5.6 to 12.6% under the same conditions of field, tractor, operator and weather. After 500 hours use, the dome tops showed some signs of abrasion while the edge of the mouldboard showed "notable" attrition. Hence it would appear that improving lubrication of the surface by inducing additional water based lubrication also reduces wear. Trials have been undertaken to investigate possible improvements that the method might achieve in the functioning of coal hoppers in electricity generating stations, and steel chain liners in dump trucks and a flexible steel liners in loader buckets.
.
Further study is now under way at Nottingham Trent University
in the hands of Reader in Thermofluids Dynamics Dr Yuying Yan to
computer model the process with a view to optimising it. Because
of the need for surfaces to be rough and in contact with water
film thicknesses, the problem is distinctly non trivial. The
study is being supported by the Chinese Government's 973
programme and The Royal Society's UK-China Joint Project
2003-2006. The team at Jilin University is one of the
participants in the BIONIS, BIOmimetics Network for Industrial
Sustainability based at the University of Reading. More
information about this may be found at www.biomimetics.org.uk .
Jilin University
email Professor Luquan Ren
">Professor Luquan Ren</a>
email Dr Yuying Yan
Pointers
* Application of small electric currents to working parts in
contact with soils result in water being transported to
negatively charged areas
* Such water films greatly assist lubrication
* Best results are obtained with rough surfaces, with negatively
charged protuberances
For more technical developments see www.eurekamagazine.co.uk