Chemical Engineering Commons^™

Alkaline Seawater Electrolysis At Industrial Level:Recent Progress And Perspective, Tao Zhang, Yi-Pu Liu, Qi-Tong Ye, Hong-Jin Fan

Journal of Electrochemistry

Industrial hydrogen generation through water splitting, powered by renewable energy such as solar, wind and marine, paves a potential way for energy and environment sustainability. However, state-of-the-art electrolysis using high purity water as hydrogen source at an industrial level would bring about crisis of freshwater resource. Seawater splitting provides a practical path to solve potable water shortage, but still faces great challenges for large-scale industrial operation. Here we summarize recent developments in seawater splitting, covering general mechanisms, design criteria for electrodes, and industrial electrolyzer for direct seawater splitting. Multi-objective optimization methods to address the key challenges of active sites, reaction …

Preface To Special Issue On Water Electrolysis For Hydrogen Production, Li Li, Jin-Song Hu, Zi-Dong Wei

Journal of Electrochemistry

No abstract provided.

Perovskite-Type Water Oxidation Electrocatalysts, Xiao Liang, Ke-Xin Zhang, Yu-Cheng Shen, Ke Sun, Lei Shi, Hui Chen, Ke-Yan Zheng, Xiao-Xin Zou

Journal of Electrochemistry

The development of energy conversion/storage technologies can achieve the reliable and stable renewable energy supply, and bring us a sustainable future. As the core half-reaction of many energy-related systems, water oxidation is the bottleneck due to its sluggish kinetics of the four-concerted proton-electron transfer (CPET) process. This necessitates the exploitation of low cost, highly active and stable water oxidation electrocatalysts. Perovskite-type oxides possess diverse crystal structures, flexible compositions and unique electronic properties, enabling them ideal material platform for the optimization of catalytic performance. In this review, we provide a comprehensive summary for the crystal structures, electronic structures and synthetic methods …

The Rapid Preparation Of Efficient Mofeco-Based Bifunctional Electrocatalysts Via Joule Heating For Overall Water Splitting, Ao Zhou, Wei-Jian Guo, Yue-Qing Wang, Jin-Tao Zhang

Journal of Electrochemistry

Water electrolysis is an available way to obtain green hydrogen. The development of highly efficient electrocatalysts is a current research hotspot for water splitting, but it remains challenging. Herein, we demonstrate the synthesis of a robust bifunctional multi-metal electrocatalysts toward water splitting via the rapid Joule-heating conversion of metal precursors. The composition and morphology were well regulated via altering the ratio of metal precursors. In particular, the trimetal MoC/FeO/CoO/carbon cloth (CC) electrode revealed the outstanding bifunctional electrocatalytic performance due to the unique composition and large electrochemical active surface area. Typically, the MoC/FeO/CoO/CC catalyst needed low overpotentials of 121 and 268 …

Recent Development Of Low Iridium Electrocatalysts Toward Efficient Water Oxidation, Jing Ni, Zhao-Ping Shi, Xian Wang, Yi-Bo Wang, Hong-Xiang Wu, Chang-Peng Liu, Jun-Jie Ge, Wei Xing

Journal of Electrochemistry

Developing high-performance and low-cost electrocatalysts for oxygen evolution reaction (OER) is the key to implementing polymer electrolyte membrane water electrolyzer (PEMWE) for hydrogen production. To date, iridium (Ir) is the state-of-the-art OER catalyst, but still suffers from the insufficient activity and scarce earth abundance, which results in high cost both in stack and electricity. Design low-Ir catalysts with enhanced activity and stability that can match the requirements of high current and long-term operation in PEMWE is thus highly desired, which necessitate a deep understanding of acidic OER mechanisms, unique insights of material design strategies, and reliable performance evaluation norm, especially …

A Co Porphyrin With Electron-Withdrawing And Hydrophilic Substituents For Improved Electrocatalytic Oxygen Reduction, Hong-Bo Guo, Ya-Ni Wang, Kai Guo, Hai-Tao Lei, Zuo-Zhong Liang, Xue-Peng Zhang, Rui Cao

Journal of Electrochemistry

Understanding factors that influence the catalyst activity for oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) is essential for the rational design of efficient ORR catalysts. Regulating catalyst electronic structure is commonly used to fine-tune electrocatalytic ORR activity. However, modifying the hydrophilicity of catalysts has been rarely reported to improve ORR, which happens at the liquid/gas/solid interface. Herein, we report on two Co porphyrins, namely, NO₂-CoP (Co complex of 5,10,15,20-tetrakis(4-nitrophenyl)porphyrin) and 5F-CoP (Co complex of 5,10,15,20-tetrakis(pentafluorophenyl)porphyrin), and their electrocatalytic ORR features. By simultaneously controlling the electronic structure and hydrophilic property of the meso-substituents, the NO₂-CoP showed higher electrocatalytic activity than …

Surface Structure Engineering Of Feni-Based Pre-Catalyst For Oxygen Evolution Reaction: A Mini Review, Jia-Xin Li, Li-Gang Feng

Journal of Electrochemistry

Nitrite, a widespread raw material, is harmful to human health for long-term consumption. At present, the detection methods of nitrite mainly include chemical analysis, fluorescence, ultraviolet spectrophotometry and chromatography. These methods have ideal sensitivity and selectivity, but also have some characteristics: cumbersome operation, expensive equipment and professional personnel. Therefore, the development of a simple and sensitive nitrite assay is of great significance. In this paper, the Au/rGO/FeOOH composite materials, which revealed good synergistic catalytic performance among the three elements in the composite, were prepared by simple hydrothermal method and reduction method for the first time with large specific surface area …

A Control Barrier Function Perspective On Lyapunov-Based Economic Model Predictive Control, Helen Durand, Aaron D. Ames

Chemical Engineering and Materials Science Faculty Research Publications

No abstract provided.

Evaluation Of Material Request Order To Support Sustainable Construction, Fajar Susilowati, Nur Nahdiah Anggraeni

Makara Journal of Technology

This study was conducted on one of Indonesia’s apartment projects, in which reinforced concrete is the main structure. Based on existing project data, this project experienced a decline in the construction work’s progress, thus reducing the project’s overall progress. This decline occurred because the delivery of concrete reinforcement material was delayed. This study aimed to determine the process of material request order and its relationship with the work implementation, as well as the factors that influenced the delayed arrival of concrete reinforcement material at the project site. The method used in this study was observation and interview. Data were analyzed …

Low-Crystallinity And Heterostructured Aupt-Ru@Cnts As Highly Efficient Multifunctional Electrocatalyst, Tuan-Jie Gan, Jian-Ping Wu, Shi Liu, Wen-Jun Ou, Ling Bin, Xiong-Wu Kang

Journal of Electrochemistry

The catalytic activity of the catalysts is strongly dependent on the structure of the catalysts, and the exploration of their correlation and structure-controlled synthesis of the high-performance catalysts are always at the central. Currently, platinum (Pt) is the optimum catalyst for hydrogen evolution reaction (HER), oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) and alcohol oxidation reaction, while ruthenium (Ru) behaves as the champion catalyst for oxygen evolution reaction (OER) during water splitting. Preparing alloy catalysts with these precious metals can modulate the catalytic activity of these catalysts from the perspective of strain effect, ensemble effect and ligand effect. Here, we developed a strategy …

Facile One-Step Solid-State Synthesis Of Ni-Rich Layered Oxide Cathodes For Lithium-Ion Batteries, Jing-Yue Wang, Rui Wang, Shi-Qi Wang, Li-Fan Wang, Chun Zhan

Journal of Electrochemistry

Nickel-rich layered oxide is one of the dominate cathode materials in the lithium ion batteries, due to its high specific energy density meeting the range requirement of the electric vehicles. Typically, the commercial Ni-rich layered oxides are synthesized from co-precipitated precursors, while precision control is required in the co-precipitation process to ensure the atomic level mixing of the cations such as Ni, Co and Mn, et.al. In this work, a one-step solid-state method was successfully applied to synthesize the Ni-rich layered oxide materials with ultra-high Ni content. By choosing the nickel hydroxides as the precursor with layered structure similar to …

Myosin Ii Adjusts Motility Properties And Regulates Force Production Based On Motor Environment, Omayma Y. Al Azzam, Janie C. Watts, Justin E. Reynolds, Juliana E. Davis, Dana N. Reinemann

Faculty and Student Publications

Introduction—Myosin II has been investigated with optical trapping, but single motor-filament assay arrangements are not reflective of the complex cellular environment. To understand how myosin interactions propagate up in scale to accomplish system force generation, we devised a novel actomyosin ensemble optical trapping assay that reflects the hierarchy and compliancy of a physiological environment and is modular for interrogating force effectors.

Methods—Hierarchical actomyosin bundles were formed in vitro. Fluorescent template and cargo actin filaments (AF) were assembled in a flow cell and bundled by myosin. Beads were added in the presence of ATP to bind the cargo AF …

Ultraviolet Chiral Plasmonics, Tiago Ramos Leite Da Silva

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

The far- (λ < 250 nm) ultraviolet (UV) chiroptical response from protein secondary structures can aid in understanding protein interactions for drug discovery. Chiral metasurfaces have attracted attention to enhance the intrinsically weak biomolecular optical activity for improved structural biology characterization. However, due to materials and fabrication challenges, current metasurfaces mostly operate in the visible and near-infrared regimes with limited, if any, response in far-UV. The large spectral mismatch between metasurface and biomolecular resonances limits the chiral enhancement factor. In this work, we study aluminum planar metamaterials which display optical activity in the UV region. In the first part of this work, we experimentally and computationally investigate the resonant plasmonic-biomolecular interactions in the far-UV. To the best of our knowledge, our work is the first to experimentally explore these resonant interactions in the biologically relevant far-UV regime. We demonstrate experimentally and computationally enhanced chiral sensing of sub-10 nm amino acid films. We develop a full-wave computational model of a biomolecular film on an aluminum gammadion array using experimentally derived chiral parameters (κ) for L- and DTyrosine films. Our model shows that detectable enhancements in the circular dichroism (CD) and birefringence (CB) signals from small amounts of biomolecules are only possible when tight spectral overlap exists between the plasmonic and biomolecular chiroptical signals. We support this conclusion experimentally by fabricating aluminum gammadion arrays on fused silica substrates and sublimating ultrathin racemic, L- and D- Tyrosine films on the arrays. Complete Mueller matrix analysis of the resonant plasmonic-biomolecular system agrees with our computational results and demonstrates the importance of using far-UV active metasurfaces for enhancing natural optical activity. In the second part of this work, we study hybrid aluminum reflective metasurfaces, which leverage both local and propagating surface plasmons (PSP). These materials display strong bi-anisotropy with rich polarization conversion properties. We explore several geometries and verify how their symmetry properties affect their far-field response. Our observations provide an opportunity for researchers to improve the chiral response of plasmonic metasurfaces, especially in the challenging ultraviolet regime.

Fabrication Of Nb3Sn By Magnetron Sputtering For Superconducting Radiofrequency Application, Md Nizam Sayeed

Electrical & Computer Engineering Theses & Dissertations

Particle accelerators are considered as an important device that has wide applications in cancer treatment, sterilizing waste, preserving foods, ion implantation in semiconductor industry, and in production of isotopes for medical applications. Superconducting radiofrequency (SRF) cavities are the building blocks of a linear particle accelerator. Current particle accelerators use niobium (Nb) superconductors as the sheet material to fabricate a single SRF cavity for particle acceleration. With better superconducting properties (critical temperature T_c ~ 18.3 K, superheating field H_sh~ 400 mT), Nb₃Sn is considered a potential candidate in SRF technology. Magnetron sputtering is a promising deposition …

Development Of High Quantum Efficiency Strained Superlattice Spin Polarized Photocathodes Via Metal Organic Chemical Vapor Deposition, Benjamin Belfore

Electrical & Computer Engineering Theses & Dissertations

Spin polarized photocathodes are necessary to examine parity violations and other fundamental phenomena in the field of high energy physics. To create these devices, expensive and complicated growth processes are necessary. While integral to accelerator physics, spin polarized electrons could have other exciting applications in materials science and other fields of physics. In order to explore these other applications feasibly, the relative supply of spin polarized photocathodes with a high rate of both polarization and photoemission needs to be increased. One such way to increase this supply is to develop the means to grow them faster and at a larger …

Control Implemented On Quantum Computers: Effects Of Noise, Nondeterminism, And Entanglement, Kip Nieman, Keshav Kasturi Rangan, Helen Durand

Chemical Engineering and Materials Science Faculty Research Publications

Quantum computing has advanced in recent years to the point that there are now some quantum computers and quantum simulators available to the public for use. In addition, quantum computing is beginning to receive attention within the process systems engineering community for directions such as machine learning and optimization. A logical next step for its evaluation within process systems engineering is for control, specifically for computing control actions to be applied to process systems. In this work, we provide some initial studies regarding the implementation of control on quantum computers, including the implementation of a single-input/single-output proportional control law on …

New Solid Polymer Electrolytes For Lithium, Sodium, And Calcium-Based Batteries, Francielli Silva Genier

Dissertations - ALL

The establishment of sustainable energy sources highly depends on efficient storage devices to guarantee a consistent power supply. The growing demand for lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) for this purpose, combined with concerns about lithium availability, has motivated the search for viable storage alternatives, such as sodium and calcium. While several studies have investigated different lithium-free liquid electrolytes, the transport of these alternative ions in their polymer counterparts remains understudied. The advantages of solid polymer electrolytes include the possibility of higher energy density in solid-state devices and the elimination of safety concerns associated with liquid electrolytes, such as flammability, leakage, and dendrite …

The Effective Strategies For Mitigation The Impact Of Covid-19 On Construction Projects In Egypt, Nora Magdy Essa, Ibrahim Mahdi, Hassan Mohamed Ibrahim

Future Engineering Journal

From the time when the first narrated infections in Wuhan China, in late 2019, COVID-19 has had a substantial peal on human life and health. By the early of 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) announced the eruption of COVID-19, a public health crisis of international concern. On 11 March 2020, the World Health Organization officially announced COVID-19 a pandemic. The first case was infected in Egypt of covid-19 on Feb 14, 2020 (Gilbert et al., 2020). On 16 March 2020, the Egyptian Government began issuing decisions as preventative courses as part of the country's inclusive plan to cope with …

Estimating The Weights Of Latticed Power Transmission Towers Using Genetic Programming, Ahmed M. Ebid Dr.

Future Engineering Journal

The recent booming in the power network industry inspired a lot of researchers to develop models to estimate the optimum cost of transmission towers. Unlike previous researches which depended on design the tower from scratch, this research depends on collecting actual database from several projects around the globe and applying the well-known (GP) technique to develop a model to predict the tower weight. The accuracy of the developed formula was about 84%. The developed model could be used in early tender stage or to check design economy.

Actuator Cyberattack Handling Using Lyapunov-Based Economic Model Predictive Control, Keshav Kasturi Rangan, Henrique Oyama, Helen Durand

Chemical Engineering and Materials Science Faculty Research Publications

Cybersecurity has gained increasing interest as a consequence of the potential impacts of cyberattacks on profits and safety. While attacks can affect various components of a plant, prior work from our group has focused on the impact of cyberattacks on control components such as process sensors and actuators and the development of detection strategies for cybersecurity derived from control theory. In this work, we provide greater focus on actuator attacks; specifically, we extend a detection and control strategy previously applied for sensor attacks and based on an optimization-based control technique called Lyapunov-based economic model predictive control (LEMPC) to detect attacks …

Test Methods For Image-Based Information In Next-Generation Manufacturing, Henrique Oyama, Dominic Messina, Renee O'Neill, Samantha Cherney, Minhazur Rahman, Keshav Kasturi Rangan, Govanni Gjonaj, Helen Durand

Chemical Engineering and Materials Science Faculty Research Publications

Typical control designs in the process systems engineering literature have assumed that the primary sensing methodologies are traditional instruments such as thermocouples. Dig- italization is changing the landscape for manufacturing, and data-based sensing modalities (e.g., image-based sensing) are becoming of greater interest for plant control. These considerations require novel test/evaluation solutions. For example, process systems engineering researchers may wish to test image-based sensors in simulation. In this work, we provide preliminary thoughts on how image-based technologies might be evaluated via simulation for process systems.

Quantum Computing And Resilient Design Perspectives For Cybersecurity Of Feedback Systems, Keshav Kasturi Rangan, Jihan Abou Halloun, Henrique Oyama, Samantha Cherney, Ilham Azali Assoumani, Nazir Jairazbhoy, Helen Durand, Simon Ka Ng

Chemical Engineering and Materials Science Faculty Research Publications

Cybersecurity of control systems is an important issue in next-generation manufac- turing that can impact both operational objectives (safety and performance) as well as process designs (via hazard analysis). Cyberattacks differ from faults in that they can be coordinated efforts to exploit system vulnerabilities to create otherwise unlikely hazard scenarios. Because coordination and targeted process manipulation can be characteristics of attacks, some of the tactics previously analyzed in our group from a control system cybersecurity perspective have incorporated randomness to attempt to thwart attacks. The underlying assumption for the generation of this randomness has been that it can be achieved …

Challenges And Opportunities For Next-Generation Manufacturing In Space, Kip Nieman, A. F. Leonard, Katie Tyrell, Dominic Messina, Rebecca Lopez, Helen Durand

Chemical Engineering and Materials Science Faculty Research Publications

With commercial space travel now a reality, the idea that people might spend time on other planets in the future seems to have greater potential. To make this possible, however, there needs to be flexible means for manufacturing in space to enable tooling or resources to be created when needed to handle unexpected situations. Next-generation manufacturing paradigms offer significant potential for the kind of flexibility that might be needed; however, they can result in increases in computation time compared to traditional control methods that could make many of the computing resources already available on earth attractive for use. Furthermore, resilience …

On-Line Process Physics Tests Via Lyapunov-Based Economic Model Predictive Control And Simulation-Based Testing Of Image-Based Process Control, Henrique Oyama, A. F. Leonard, Minhazur Rahman, Govanni Gjonaj, Michael Williamson, Helen Durand

Chemical Engineering and Materials Science Faculty Research Publications

Next-generation manufacturing involves increasing use of automation and data to enhance process efficiency. An important question for the chemical process industries, as new process systems (e.g., intensified processes) and new data modalities (e.g., images) are integrated with traditional plant automation concepts, will be how to best evaluate alternative strategies for data-driven modeling and synthesizing process data. Two methods which could be used to aid in this are those which aid in testing data-based techniques on-line, and those which enable various data-based techniques to be assessed in simulation. In this work, we discuss two techniques in this domain which can be …

Quantum Computing And Resilient Design Perspectives For Cybersecurity Of Feedback Systems, Keshav Kasturi Rangan, Jihan Abou Halloun, Henrique Oyama, Samantha Cherney, Ilham Azali Assoumani, Nazir Jairazbhoy, Helen Durand, Simon Ka Ng

Chemical Engineering and Materials Science Faculty Research Publications

Cybersecurity of control systems is an important issue in next-generation manufac- turing that can impact both operational objectives (safety and performance) as well as process designs (via hazard analysis). Cyberattacks differ from faults in that they can be coordinated efforts to exploit system vulnerabilities to create otherwise unlikely hazard scenarios. Because coordination and targeted process manipulation can be characteristics of attacks, some of the tactics previously analyzed in our group from a control system cybersecurity perspective have incorporated randomness to attempt to thwart attacks. The underlying assumption for the generation of this randomness has been that it can be achieved …

Electrochemical Synthesis Of Acetylpyrazine, Lin Mao, Dong-Fang Niu, Shuo-Zhen Hu, Xin-Sheng Zhang

Journal of Electrochemistry

Acetylpyrazine is naturally presented in hazelnuts, peanuts, and sesame seeds. As an important food additive, it is widely used in baked foods, meat, sesame and tobacco. At the same time, acetylpyrazine is also an important pharmaceutical intermediate, which is used in the syntheses of anti-tuberculosis drugs, anti-tumor, anti-malaria, anti-viral, antibacterial and treatments of epilepsy, pain and Parkinson’s drugs. At present, the synthesis methods of acetylpyrazine include oxidation method, multi-step method and Grignard reagent method, which have the disadvantages of low yield, cumbersome process, severe reaction conditions and high cost. In this study, acetylation of pyrazine was used to synthesize acetylpyrazine …

Electrocatalytic "Volcano-Type" Effect Of Nano-Tio2 (A)/(R) Phase Content In Pt/Tio2-CnX Catalyst, Ai-Lin Cui, Yang Bai, Hong-Ying Yu, Hui-Min Meng

Journal of Electrochemistry

The relationship between the electrochemical activity of fuel cell catalysts and Pt particle size, as well as the catalyst support and co-catalyst is still unclear. In this work, FESEM, XRD, BET, TEM and CV techniques were adopted to investigate the effects of TiO₂ anatase (A)/rutile (R) phases content on the electrochemical activity of Pt electrocatalyst. The results showed that the anatase-rutile phase transformation occurred during the heat treatment of TiO₂ at 700 ~ 900 ^oC accompanied by the growth of two-phase crystalline size, and anatase was completely transformed into rutile at 900 ^oC. TEM results revealed …

Study And Improvement On Expansion Property Of Silicon Oxide, Wei-Chuan Qiao, Fang-Ru Li, Jin-Lin Xiao, Li-Juan Qu, Xiao Zhao, Meng Zhang, Chun-Lei Pang, Zi-Kun Li, Jian-Guo Ren, Xue-Qin He

Journal of Electrochemistry

The silicon-based anode materials have the potential to meet the ever-increasing demand for energy density in lithium-ion batteries market owing to their high theoretical specific capacity. Unfortunately, their commercialization was hindered by the continuous volume expansion. Herein, the expansion characteristics and corresponding mechanism of the silicon oxide and graphite-silicon oxide composites were investigated by in-situ displacement detection systematically. The results showed that the expansion property was improved by material process modifications. During the de/lithiation processes of graphite, the expansion ratio in 30% ~ 50% SOC changed little because of the small interlayer spacing variation of the intercalated graphite. …

Preparation And Properties Of Gcp-Supported Palladium Particles Composite Towards Electrochemical Ammonia Synthesis, Ying-Chao Wang, Zi-Zai Ma, Yi-Fan Wu, Xiao-Guang Wang

Journal of Electrochemistry

Ammonia (NH₃) plays an essential role in agriculture and modern industries. Electrochemical fixation of nitrogen (N₂) to ammonia (NRR) under ambient conditions with renewable electricity is a promising strategy to replace the industrial Haber-Bosch method. However, it usually suffers from extremely poor ammonia yield and low Faraday efficiency due to the poor electrocatalysts. Therefore, intensive studies have been devoted to developing efficient NRR catalysts till now. Among them, palladium (Pd) can capture protons in the aqueous phase to form stable α-PdH, which balances the competitive adsorption between nitrogen and protons as well as reduces the …

Receptor-Doped Organic Transistors: Transducing Anion Binding From Mixed Ionic-Electronic Transport, Anthony Benasco

Dissertations

Organic semiconductors based on π-conjugated polymers show remarkable properties such as high tolerance to structural defects, low processing temperature requirements, biocompatibility, ease of fabrication, and tunable properties. Conjugated polymers integrated into device arrays can exhibit collective properties sensitive to minor perturbations in the surrounding media. However, these devices rely on serendipitous sensitivity to the analyte of interest, and strategies for specific detection remain a considerable change. There remains a compelling, global need for technologies to monitor phosphate due to its prevalence in agricultural runoff, leading to fish kills and economic decline for commercial and recreational fisheries. The strong hydration energies …