Seville, April 12, 2017. Researchers from the ‘Surface Nanotechnology’ group, attached to the Institute of Materials Science of Seville (ICMS), belonging to cicCartuja, are participating in the ‘Phobic2ICE Project’, a consortium between companies in the aeronautics sector, universities and Canadian and European research centers.
Specifically, the consortium is made up of nine partners: two large companies (Airbus – Germany and Pratt & Whitney – Canada) and two SMEs (Plasmionique and Dema Aeronautics – Canada). The research groups come from the Concordia and Polytechnic Universities of Montreal, the Higher Council for Scientific Research, the National Institute of Aerospace Technology (INTA – Spain) and the Technology Partners Foundation (Poland)
The project aims to design materials with repellent properties that allow the manufacture of coatings that prevent the accumulation of ice on crucial parts of aircraft such as wings, propellers, vents or antennas.
Stopping the accumulation of ice is essential, since the formation of layers of ice can severely affect the operation of the aircraft. For this reason, the aim is to develop technologies and coatings to partially mitigate this phenomenon.
Part of the infrastructure that will allow research into the manufacture of these ice-phobic materials is located in Germany, but it is expected that the tests and the commissioning of the treated aircraft will take place in Spain.
To date, two technical meetings have been held on this project: the first took place in Canada and the second was held in Spain, at the facilities of the National Institute of Aerospace Technology (INTA), in Madrid, and at the cicCartuja, with the attendance of the head of the ‘Surface Nanotechnology’ group, Agustín Rodríguez González-Elipe, and Ana Isabel Borrás, Victor Rico and Maria del Carmen López, also attached to the same research group.
More information at http://www.phobic2ice.com