Spheric Technologies, Inc. (Phoenix, Ariz.) has been awarded a patent for "Process and Apparatus for Manufacturing Metal Oxides and Byproduct Hydrogen."

Spheric Technologies, Inc. (Phoenix, Ariz.) has been awarded a patent for "Process and Apparatus for Manufacturing Metal Oxides and Byproduct Hydrogen." The company's process is less expensive and environmentally cleaner than conventional chemical processing methods used to obtain technical-grade oxides. With Spheric's process, the resulting high-purity powders have uniform particle size and density, making them useful in a wide variety of applications.

In the process, sacrificial electrodes of high-purity metal are immersed in water. When a current is applied, an electric arc occurs and a plasma zone is created in the water between the electrodes. The plasma zone is maintained so that metal oxide and hydrogen are continuously produced.