Toray Industries announced that it has created what it describes as the world’s first porous carbon fiber with a nano-sized continuous pore structure. The fiber can be used as a support layer to make membranes used in greenhouse gas separation and hydrogen production lighter and more compact through flexible fibers. Such support makes it possible to combine a range of gas separation layers. The new material is chemically stable, as it is made of carbon, and offers high levels of gas permeability.
Toray created the new material by combining its polymer technology with its carbon fiber technologies and water treatment and other separation membrane technologies. The porous carbon fiber has uniformly continuous pores and carbon. It is possible to set nano- through micro-level pore sizes for porous structures or to create a hollow fiber-shaped porous carbon fiber in the center of a fiber.
