Air-purifying lampshade reduces indoor pollution via chemical reaction
A lampshade coated in either a copper or iron substance removes indoor air pollutants released by cooking or from cleaning products
By Chen Ly
16 August 2023
The lampshade created by researchers that uses heat from the lightbulb to convert air pollutants into small amounts of carbon dioxide and water
Minhyung Lee
Lampshades coated with an iron or copper-based substance could help tackle indoor air pollution.
Indoor air can be just as poor quality and harmful to health as outdoor urban air, mostly due to so-called volatile organic compounds (VOCs). Made up of toxic chemicals, such as acetaldehyde and formaldehyde, these can be released from paint, cleaning products, furniture or during cooking.
To tackle this issue, Hyoungil Kim at Yonsei University in South Korea and his colleagues have developed a cheap pollutant-eliminating lampshade, which they presented at a meeting of the American Chemical Society in San Francisco, California, on 15 August.
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Last year, the team created a substance made of titanium oxide and platinum that speeds up chemical reactions using heat emitted from lightbulbs to oxidise VOCs into acetic acid and formic acid, and then into tiny amounts of carbon dioxide and water.
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Cleaning products cause indoor pollution levels similar to a busy road
Now, the researchers have made a lower-cost version of the technology that uses either copper or iron.
