University of Liverpool spin-out company, ThioTech, has been announced as the winner of the Royal Society of Chemistry’s (RSC) 2024 Emerging Technologies Competition in the Environment category.
The RSC Emerging Technologies Competition identifies and supports UK-based chemistry-led technologies. To achieve this accolade, the ThioTech Team had to convince a panel of industry heavyweights from some of the most prominent companies in the world that their innovations could tackle societal, environmental and economic challenges facing the world today, while also delivering their planned approach to commercialisation. They will receive £25,000 in funding to accelerate and grow the business.
ThioTech has developed a new patented technology to capture highly toxic compounds of mercury in addition to recovering precious metals such as gold, more efficiently and sustainably.
Founded by University of Liverpool researchers Dr Bowen Zhang (CEO) and Dr Tom Hasell (CSO) from the Department of Chemistry, Thiotech has developed a series of sulfur containing materials which can bond selectively with certain dissolved metal ions, making it an ideal technology for both waste management and recovery of precious metals from mining effluent, and many other industries.
They have found that by reacting sulfur, sourced from unwanted stockpiles, with sustainably sourced organic co-monomers, in a process called inverse vulcanisation, stable inverse vulcanised polymers can be formed.
These unique materials can enhance sulfur’s high affinity to absorb heavy metals like mercury, whilst being much more convenient that powdered sulfur. Thiotech have developed methods to significantly increase the amount of available surface area of these materials – allowing for high mercury capacities and rapid absorption rates.
After completing the Innovation-to-Commercialisation of University Research (ICURe) programme run by the NorthbyNorthwest (NxNW) consortium of Universities including the University of Liverpool, ThioTech were recommended for spin-out.
They were successful in their application for Innovate UK ICURe follow-on-funding of £300k, which was matched with £150k from the University of Liverpool’s Enterprise Investment Fund, an award available for staff to de-risk technologies developed at the University.
Since then, ThioTech have received a series of investments from a technology venture capital firm, Deepbridge Capital, and continue to further develop, test and validate its technology and product portfolio, expand the R&D team, and engage with global industry leaders in clean technology and chemical manufacturing sectors.
The team’s work is particularly timely as the Minamata Convention on Mercury, a global treaty that aims to reduce mercury emissions, is pushing for regulations around mercury waste to be tightened around the world. Mercury is toxic to humans, wildlife and ecosystems, often building up within marine food chains to levels that have a significant health, especially in children, when the fish are consumed.
ThioTech’s novel method closes the gap between economics and performance left by other remediation approaches by providing an inexpensive and highly effective approach using sulfur.
Bowen Zhang, CEO of ThioTech said:
“We are delighted to have won this award. We have turned our research into a product which is set to make such a significant impact on communities in all parts of the world. Dealing with the challenges of mercury remediation, as well as more sustainable ways to harvest gold, are very motivating to drive our business to further successes.”
You can find out more about ThioTech at www.thiotech.co.uk or by emailing info@thiotech.co.uk.
The formation of this company was supported by the University of Liverpool’s Enterprise Team. The University’s portfolio goes from strength to strength, with 24 spin-out companies formed in the last six years.