Jet engines take the heat

Ohio State University engineers are developing a technology to coat jet engine turbine blades with zirconium dioxide - commonly called zirconia, the stuff of synthetic diamonds - to combat high-temperature corrosion.

The zirconia chemically converts sand and other corrosive particles that build up on the blade into a new, protective outer coating. In effect, the surface of the engine blade constantly renews itself.

Ultimately, the technology could enable manufacturers to use new kinds of heat-resistant materials in engine blades, so that engines will be able to run hotter and more efficiently.

Nitin Padture, Prof of materials science and engineering at Ohio State, said that he had military aircraft in mind when he began the project. He was then a professor at the University of Connecticut.

'In the desert, sand is sucked into the engines during takeoffs and landings,' he said, 'but even commercial aircraft and power turbines encounter small bits of sand or other particles, and those particles damage turbine blades.'