of tea and hard drives...

[Guest guest]

Green tea polishes hard drive heads

 

 

 

18:10 27 April 04

 

 

 

NewScientist.com news service

 

 

 

Green tea provides a more effective and environmentally-friendly method

of preparing computer hard disks, say US scientists.

 

Inside a hard drive a component known as a read-write head is used to

magnetically impart and retrieve information from a spinning disk. The

point of this head must be extremely smooth as it travels on a

microscopically thin layer of air above the disk's fast-moving surface.

 

In fact, imperfections larger than 10 angstroms (a billionth of a

metre) may interfere with the normal operation of the head.

 

So manufacturing a new read-write head involves smoothing it using a

diamond instrument before using abrasive chemicals to remove any

particles that still cling to the newly polishing surface.

 

But John Lombardi, at Ventana Research based in Tuscon, Arizona in the

US, suspected that green tea might also provide be an effective

compound for polishing magnetic read-write heads. This was because

tannin, a chemical that gives tea and coffee a bitter taste, binds to

certain ceramic and metal materials. It is this quality that causes it

to stain teapots and mugs.

 

 

Together with researchers at Pace Technologies in Arizona, and the

University of Arizona, Lombardi developed a polishing mixture using

tannins and other plant extracts from green tea. The precise formula

remains a secret but Lombardi says it is not only more effective than

existing compounds, but also less environmentally harmful because it is

biodegradable.

 

The researchers combined chemicals from green tea with synthetic

proteins and an abrasive chemical it produced a mixture well suited to

removing microscopic imperfections. By binding to these particles, the

mixture gives them an electrostatic charge, causing them to be repelled

from the platter's surface.

 

" The tannin phytochemicals play a dual role by increasing the polishing

rate and enhancing the removal of particles produced by the polishing

process, " says Srini Raghavan at the University of Arizona.

 

Further testing of the fluid is required before it can be used

commercially. But Lombardi hopes this will be completed by the end of

2004.

 

 

 

Will Knight

 

 

[Guest guest]

> Green tea polishes hard drive heads

 

I wonder if it makes them faster and keeps them from going to sleep.

 

*************************

David Bruce Leonard, L.Ac.

Medicine at your Feet

 

http://www.medicineatyourfeet.com