Planetary Centrifugal Nano Pulverizer: NP-100

Thinky Corporation’s groundbreaking NP-100 planetary centrifugal nano pulverizer utilizes the same planetary centrifugal system as THINKY MIXER. Though pulverization of particles of size equal to or less than 3 μm is hard by dry-milling, nano pulverization is realized by wet-milling.

A researcher and user of THINKY MIXER began designing the NP-100, proposing the feasibility of pulverizing nanomaterials.

The planetary centrifugal system comprises two axes, where the container rotates anticlockwise while revolving clockwise at a specific radius around an axis. Zirconia balls with exceptional abrasion resistance are used as the pulverizing medium, and filled in the container, which revolves and rotates at great speed to apply centrifugal force on the medium.

The pulverizing medium with centrifugal force crushes against the material, causing the collision energy to make the material finer.

Features and Benefits of the NP-100

With an ideal rotation-revolution ratio, the innovative, exclusive NP-100 planetary centrifugal nano pulverizer increases the collision energy of the pulverizing medium. It produces powerful centrifugal force during revolution and rotation, and the pulverizing medium speeds up to crush the materials in the container.

The substantial enhancement in pulverization efficiency enables fine crushing (100 nm), ultralow volume (100 mg), and very fast (2 minutes) pulverization, which were previously considered impossible.

Furthermore, the mounted cooling mechanism can lower the temperature within the chamber to −20 °C, minimizing contamination risk and maintaining the crystal structure of compounds with a low melting point throughout the nano pulverization process.

Exceptional operability offers simple operation, a batch system without laborious cleaning, and a mesh filter for effortlessly collecting the medium after pulverization.

As NP-100 has the ability to pulverize both organic and inorganic materials, and crushes a minimum quantity of sample as required, it is used as an indispensable tool for research works involving high-cost/high-tech materials. The areas of operations of the NP-100 system are growing not only in the medical field but also in several other fields.

Applications of the NP-100

Next-Generation Batteries

The NP-100 nano pulverizer has been employed for examining next-generation batteries. Shohji Tsushima from the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Osaka University makes use of this equipment to enhance the research and development of future energy devices. Flow batteries and polymer electrolyte fuel cells are projected to become significant power storage devices.

Tsushima explores the improvement of flow battery performance by the effective supply of electrolytes to porous carbon electrodes, so that the phase interfaces created by the electrodes and the electrolyte can be utilized to the maximum.

Pulverizing Pharmaceutical Drugs into Nanoparticles

I started using THINKY MIXER more than ten years ago to prepare suspensions for safety studies at the Research Laboratories of Pfizer Inc., where I worked at the time ... Compared with conventional stirrer mixing, THINKY MIXER is easy and can prepare a uniform suspension in rapidly.

Naofumi Hashimoto, Professor, Pharmaceutical Sciences, Setsunan University