FORT WAYNE, Ind. — Purdue Fort Wayne has received two grants totalling more than $500,000 for recycling research.

The first is funding a two-year, $100,000 effort to help create a machine to sort a variety of recyclable plastic bottles for conversion into chemicals and other usable materials while also reducing production costs.

The second grant of over $400,000 was submitted with UHV Technologies and Penn State University to work on sorting batteries for recycling. This three-year project has the goal of increasing consumer participation in battery recycling programs, improving the economics of recycling, and establishing state and local collection programs.