The market
Estimates indicate that a third of all the energy spent in the world is used to overcome friction. The cost of friction based on the early replacement of parts and the increase in fuel consumption reaches around 250 billion dollars worldwide. The need to fight against friction goes from garages and stores to the strategic positioning of multinationals. Currently, there are three major technological platforms for companies to reduce friction. First, there is a lubrication market of $ 40 billion which provides technical oils to reduce friction. Then, there is a market for balls and rollers of $ 65 billion which should grow by 8.5 % per year until 2014. Finally, the friction is reduced by the application of industrial diamonds, that It is natural or synthetic. It's still worth $ 10 billion. Ball bearings are used when the speed is significant, a roller bearing is used when the load is important. The ball and roller bearings are used in all industries: transport (automobile, rail, air), electrical energy (hydraulic, coal, wind), textiles, mines, sports equipment, air conditioning, food and even precision industries . Global wind energy growth, based on turbines, stimulates the demand for special ball bearings. SKF controls around 20 % of the world market. Schäffler is the German competitor controlled by the family. The miniaturization of a wide range of devices increases the demand for tiny ball bearings with an outside diameter less than 22 millimeters. Minebea Co. Ltd. of Japan is the largest producer of the smallest ball bearings in the world.
Innovation
Finding a reduction in friction is a secular company and companies are increasingly creative. Mercedes-Benz has modeled a concept car based on bionic sliding in the wind with the aerodynamics of a fish. According to the Georgia Institute of Technology of Atlanta (United States), the rationalization of the design of trucks to reduce friction could reduce the trail by 12 %, which would save 1.2 billion gallons of fuel per year in America. The automotive industry is under pressure to build better engines, which are much more efficient in fuel because they generate better combustion, but more difficult to lubricate. Nanometric spheres called Flelertenes can now be mixed with ordinary engine oil to create an ultra-thin film inside the engine, only a few microns thick to reduce friction up to 50 %. With oil prices around 80 dollars a barrel and which will certainly increase in the years to come, researchers design hybrid bearings which never dry up and which never cease to roll for lack of lubricant agents. These bearings are not made of steel, but design materials such as silicon nitride ceramics, an alloy of self -olubrly graphite. Metal bearings are expected to one day be replaced by ceramic bearings which suffer less corrosion. Ingo Sounberg, aeronautical engineer of the Berlin Technical University (Germany) and the University of Cambridge (United Kingdom), is passionate about the optimization of technical systems based on the observation of biological evolution. His search for hydrogen brought him to the Sahara, in southern Morocco, where he studied bacteria producing hydrogen. By coincidence, he observed how the Sébaste of the Sahara, a lizard, swims with the least friction and the least abrasion possible in the sand dunes. He discovered that this reptile creates nano-episses and crests on its scales to reduce the friction and wear of the surface. The Sébaste travels about a kilometer every morning, so it is permanently scratched by the sand. When the lizard plunges into the dune, its skin surface remains smooth and shiny. According to Dr sought, expert in evolution biology, energy saving is the main task of biological systems. He and his team measured skin friction and abrasion and concluded that cylindrical steel has 58 % more friction than the Sébaste. While the sand causes abrasion with steel and glass, the skin of the lizard has shown no damage in comparable conditions. His team has studied all scientific options and one of the work hypotheses is that the tip of the peaks of the skin, which contains silicon could work as an electron transmitter. Perhaps the Sébaste works like two negatively loaded magnets: they repel each other. Thus, the Sébaste may have invented magnetic levitation long before German and Japanese engineers designed it as a new mode of rail transport with low friction. It is an intelligent conception of the Sahara ecosystem, which is negatively loaded, and the Sébaste which seems to have found a solution to prosper in its habitat.
The first cash flow
The work of Dr sought is still in the initial discovery phase. However, it provides intriguing information that could be extremely interesting for micro-electromechanical systems (MEMS). This is the integration of mechanical elements, sensors and electronics. The safety system called Airbag is controlled by a MEMS. A sensor notes the shock, micro-electric processes information with a decision-making capacity and the mechanical device releases air to protect passengers. These tiny systems involve very few mobile parts due to the high friction of these silicon -based systems. Sébaste resolved the problem using glycoproteins and carbohydrates, and a little silicon. We would call this edible chemistry, a welcome alternative to rough chemistry, high temperature and pressure of the processes that dominate the world of coatings, lubricants, synthetic diamonds and ball bearings.
The opportunity
Innovation is not ready for mass marketing. However, the identified routes constitute a solid basis for entrepreneurs ready to engage in a long-term project, developing an innovative platform technology that could impregnate almost all sectors of the global economy. Like ball bearings and lubricants have become a company of $ 100 billion in a century, those who have the foresight to focus on innovations based on the laws of physics and biochemistry to save billions of energy, will build a competitive commercial platform in the coming decades. The sebaste lizard and its intelligent way of moving to the sand can also forever change our perspective on the value of the Sahara.
