At any rate, some of the radical moieties titania makes of water and other molecules and UV light (so, that and the mercury in the CFL are your base hazards, really) are indeed ozone. Additionally, it’s basically oxidizing your stink molecules (think of hydrolizing fatty acids right up near the backbone; that’s your trouble VOC grease your guts couldn’t turn into useful exchangeable parts) into CO2; the combustion makes some heat. However, because the incandescent bulb brought us precautions in bulb use, you can use these things with no -additional- worry over the bulbs we hope to deprecate.
That said, if you were a little sloppy with filament bulbs and put them in front of your Vermeer or closely over your wardrobe, you will -not- be pleased with the bleaching effect of these CFLs!

Read magazines or podcasts like _Science_ or _Nature_ offer and you get spades of this stuff, plus some distracting stuff that takes a while to make practical use. People are still trying to get this to work with 80-190% (go to…..) humidity or in the middle of flow in sewage, industrial byproducts they want general hydrolization on, etc.
Please link if you know how to find architectural fascia or tile products with TiO2 microstructures on them; they’re in common use, but I haven’t gotten them to stir up in searches…

An ideal bulb might make crack bad air into good plus vacuumable mulch, taking notes about the sources; but this is good stuff. The only changeup is that you need the bulbs exposed, so fixtures have to be prettified s.t. the protective dome is no longer necessary. I am hope a mix of tiling the heat shield (e.g. on a ceiling badge) and mobiles can help.

There is this adjunct product which is titania in suspension; thing is, nobody gets direct sun on mini-blinds that are behind glass? If they do, I guess the roof’s open. But you don’t want to put UV LEDs on treated blinds when people could be around to get ’sun damage’; just the opposite of PIR lighting’s usual case. You also may or may not like the way it eats (or does not eat) the paint off your blinds and ages nearby things; if they’re ceramic or glass, they’ll probably age fine. Those silk plants with TiO2 (link also appreciated) age great, but they’re coated.

Oh, lord. That’s a perfect name for it, but now I’ll never eat Fritos again without thinking “Eww.”

It’s a good thing I have magic deodorizing lightbulbs.

Originally posted by hirsch22
Are there any specs on how long the coating itself lasts? It seems like the coating might run out before the bulb does.

TiO2 is an inorganic catalyst and is not consumed in the reaction. However, depending on how the coating is applied, the matrix containing the catalyst could deteoriate for various reasons. Since TiO2 catalysts are being considered for self cleaning windows, the manufacturers are developing those products based on the assumption of a long product life.

As to the light in the kitty litter box, that would certainly keep scared kittens from being too afraid of the dark to go late at night.

But seriously, that is a great idea that could be taken a step further, in addition to the light, the container itself could be coated with the material. The lining on the inside would probably never get enough UV exposure to do much of anything, but the coating on the outside would kill off all that bacteria that is so dangerous for expecting mothers and their unborn children. It still wouldn’t be safe for them to change the litter box themselves, but it would seriously reduce the chance of any dangerous bacteria infecting them by indirect means.

I found this link to be highly informative:

http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/docs/2001/109-4/innovations.html

I didn’t mean to be an alarmist. The only research I did after reading the review was visit the manufacturer’s website. They’re a little vague about what is going on, but their faq suggests that the bulbs produce “powerful oxidizers”, which made me think about ozone…

My mistake for leaping to the wrong conclusion. The link provides some pretty interesting reading about TiO2 in general.

I’m suddenly thinking a litterbox with a light and fan mounted in the top of it might sell well…

http://www.titaniumart.com/photocatalysis-ti02.html

Self cleaning car paints have been mentioned as a possible application.

While you are quite right that ozone is a strong oxidizer that is used to control odors, and that it is dangerous if concentrated enough to have any effect on odors at all, that is not at all what TiO² does.

TiO² is a Photocatalyst. It reacts with UV light to accelerate the break down of organic material. Since it is also a white powder that can be applied to a glass surface as a light diffuser it makes a great combo for something like this. It defuses the light, controls odors and filters out the UV light from the bulb all in one.

Instead of putting extra oxygen into the air like O³ (ozone) does, this pulls carbon our off organic material and combines it with oxygen to form CO². What is left of the organic molecule that is causing the bad smell breaks apart and reforms into smaller molecules that we can’t smell very well, if we can smell them at all.

The reason the Fresh² needs air circulation to work isn’t so it can spread ozone around (if it was then they would have named it Fresh³ :p ) but because it needs the organic particles floating in the air to come in contact with the TiO² coating on the light bulb’s surface.

For more info on TiO² you can google it yourself like Judie did or just go to this link for the basic mechanics of how it works.

For anyone else out there who is still curious about ozone, I find the EPA Indoor Air Quality website to be very informative.

Ozone is a very strong oxidizer, and is very effective at controlling odors… The only problem is that it’s also pretty darn bad for you. It can trigger severe reactions in people with asthma, and is a major component of smog in metropolitan areas. Ozone is fine in the upper atmosphere where it blocks UV radiation, but you definitely don’t want to be breathing it all the time.

Here are some pertinent links:

http://www.cal-iaq.org/o3_fact.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ozone
http://www.cdc.gov/niosh/pel88/10028-15.html
http://www.idph.state.il.us/envhealth/factsheets/ozone.htm

I don’t know what levels of ozone are being generated, but if it’s capable of neutralizing odors, I suggest it’s probably in excess of the EPA and OSHA standards on human exposure which are enforced in industrial and manufacturing settings.

Unfortunately, a lot of people are marketing items that specifically generate potentially dangerous concentrations of ozone under the guise of “air purifiers.” The informed consumer is a safer, wiser consumer.

Just thought I’d give you a heads up. Be safe!

Neil

http://www.the-gadgeteer.com/fresh2-odor-eliminating-light-bulb-review.html

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