Chemistry Commons^™

Preparation And Process Optimization Of Cathode Materials For Lithium-Sulfur Batteries, Kai Wu

Journal of Electrochemistry

Lithium-sulfur (Li-S) batteries represent promising candidates for next-generation energy storage system due to their high energy density and low material cost. However, the industrial application of Li-S batteries remains challenges because of the shuttle effect from lithium polysulfides and the lack of facial routes for Li-S battery preparation. To solve these problems, a cathode consisting of different commercial carbon materials, namely, acetylene black (SP), Ketjen Black (KB) and carbon nanotube (CNT), with sulfur (S) is prepared separately for Li-S battery. After the process of 8-h ball milling for KB/S composite, together with the polyvinyl pyrrolidone (PVP) binder, the cathode could …

Step-By-Step Modification Of Graphite Felt Electrode For Vanadium Redox Flow Battery, Jing-Yuan Lou, Dong-Jiang You, Xue-Jing Li

Journal of Electrochemistry

As a well-known electrode material of the vanadium redox flow battery (VRFB),graphite felt electrode is the frequently-used electrode material in VRFB, and its low electrochemical activity is one of the key factors for the low power density of VRFB. In this work, we proposed a step-by-step modification method, which used KMnO₄ to oxidize graphite felt first and then placed in an activation solution to excite its reactivity, to improve the electrochemical performance of the graphite felt electrode. According to the results from cyclic voltammetry (CV), electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM) characterizations …

Preparations And Sodium Storage Properties Of Ni3S2@Cnt Composite, Ming-Tao Duan, Yan-Shuang Meng, Hong-Shuai Zhang

Journal of Electrochemistry

Transition metal sulfides (TMSs)-based electrode materials with highly reversible sodium storage have attracted extensive attentions as one of the most prospective electrode materials for sodium ion batteries (SIBs). However, low cycling stability and rate property caused by large volume expansion and poor electronic conductivity during the electrochemical reaction still hamper their further practical application. In this work, in-situ encapsulated Ni₃S₂ nanoparticles in carbon nanotubes (Ni₃S₂@CNT) have been successfully fabricated as an anode material for high-performance SIBs by a one-step solid-phase calcination process. X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), …

Effect Of Stereotaxically-Constructed Graphene On The Negative Electrode Performance Of Lead-Acid Batteries, Pin-Song Chen, Yi-Tao Hu, Xin-Yi Zhang, Pei-Kang Shen

Journal of Electrochemistry

With the advantages of high ratio surface area, excellent conductivity and high stability, the stereotaxically-constructed graphene (SCG) material was added to the negative active material (NAM) of lead-acid battery for improving battery performance. XRD, SEM and cyclic voltammetry tests were carried out to analyze the influence of SCG on negative active material. It is found that the conversion efficiency of lead sulfate to lead in the negative active material added with SCG material was higher than that of control group, and the particle size of the lead sulfate obtained after the discharge reaction was smaller, which are favorable factors for …

Strain Control Of Layer-Resolved Negative Capacitance In Superlattices, Raymond Walter, Sergey Prosandeev, Charles Paillard, L. Bellaiche

Physics Faculty Publications and Presentations

Negative capacitance in BaTiO₃/SrTiO₃ superlattices is investigated by Monte Carlo simulations in an atomistic effective Hamiltonian model, using fluctuation formulas for responses to the local macroscopic field that incorporates depolarizing fields. We show that epitaxial strain can tune the negative capacitance of the BaTiO₃ ferroelectric layer and the overall capacitance of the system. In addition, we predict and explain an original switching of the negative capacitance from the BaTiO₃ layer to the SrTiO₃ layer at low temperatures for intermediate strains.

Spatially Directed Functionalization By Co-Electropolymerization Of Two 3,4-Ethylenedioxythiophene Derivatives On Microelectrodes Within An Array, Benjamin J. Jones, Carol Korzeniewski, Jefferson H. Franco, Shelley D. Minteer, Ingrid Fritsch

Chemistry & Biochemistry Faculty Publications and Presentations

Electrodeposited conductive copolymer films with predictable relative properties (quantities of functional groups for further modification and capacitance) are of interest in sensors, organic electronic materials and energy applications. Potentiodynamic copolymerization of films in aqueous solutions of two different thiophene derivatives, (2,3-dihydrothieno[3,4-b]dioxin-2-yl) methanol (1) and 4-((2,3-dihydrothieno[3,4-b][1,4]dioxin-2-yl)-methoxy)-4-oxobutanoic acid (2), containing 0.02 M total monomer (0, 25, 34, 50, 66, 75, 100 mol% 2), 0.05 M sodium dodecyl sulfate, and 0.1 M LiClO4, on gold microelectrodes in an array was investigated. Decreasing monomer deposited (m) from 0 to 100 mol% 2 is attributed to a decreasing pH that inhibits electropolymerization. Molar ratios of …

New Metal Based Saturable Absorber For Ultrashort Pulse Generation, Muhammad Taufiq Ahmad

Student Works (2020-2029)

Cost-efficient, robust and flexible laser systems are vital for a wide-range of applications ranging from high-precision material processing to biomedicine. This thesis aims to explore pure silver and gold based saturable absorbers (SAs) as Q-switcher and mode-locker in various fibre laser cavities. The generations of Q-switched pulses in 1-,1.55-, and 2-micron regions have been successfully demonstrated using a pure gold, which was deposited using electron beam deposition onto a PVA thin-film as SA. For instance, a stable Q-switched thulium-doped fibre laser (TDFL) operating at 1949 nm was successfully demonstrated with the gold SA. The proposed laser generates Q switched pulses …

Electromagnetic-Triboelectric-Hybrid Energy Tile For Biomechanical Green Energy Harvesting, Elaijah Islam, Abu Musa Abdullah, Aminur Rashid Chowdhury, Farzana Tasnim, Madelyne Martinez, Carolina Olivares, Karen Lozano, Mohammed Uddin

School of Integrative Biological & Chemical Sciences (Formerly Dept. of Chemistry)

Highlights

• Hybrid nanogenerator based floor-tile was developed to convert the Bio-Mechanical energy of human footsteps to Electrical Energy.

• Hybridization of Triboelectric Nanogenerator and Electro-Magnetic Generator consisting of Aluminum and Kapton.

• MoS2 is working as an electron acceptor.

• The maximum output is 1200V as open-circuit voltage, 5mA as short-circuit current, and 6W as power.

• Produces 20% more power than a commercially sold energy-harvester floor tile.

Abstract

Since the invention of Piezoelectric Nanogenerator in 2006, nanogenerators has become an attractive technology to the researchers for scavenging mechanical energy from the ambient environment for real life applications. Hybridization of these nanogenerators has been …

Porous-Electrode Theory Of Lithium Ion Battery: Old Paradigm And New Challenge, Xiao-Xiao Wang, Zi-Rui Zhou, Qiang Shan, Zeng-Ming Zhang, Jun Huang, Yu-Wen Liu, Sheng-Li Chen

Journal of Electrochemistry

A critical review on the porous electrode theory developed by Newman and his colleagues is presented. We propose several ideas for further development of this theory by analyzing its limitations. The classical Newman theory does not consider ion steric effect in describing ion transport in electrolyte solutions, which can be amended by a newly developed ion-vacancy coupled charge transfer model for ion transport in concentrated solutions. Ion transport in solid particles of active materials is essentially an ion-electron coupled transport process, and its rationality is verified by comparing the calculated and experimental diffusion coefficients of Li ⁺ ion in intercalation …

A Model For The Anodic Carbonization Of Alkaline Polymer Electrolyte Fuel Cells, Qi-Hao Li, Ying-Ming Wang, Hua-Long Ma, Li Xiao, Gong-Wei Wang, Jun-Tao Lu, Lin Zhuang

Journal of Electrochemistry

The alkaline polymer electrolyte fuel cell (APEFC) has made appreciable progress in recent years but is still suffering performance loss during discharge with air as the oxidant. Several theories have been suggested to interpret the loss. However, efforts are still needed to reach a clear quantitative understanding. Based on the major experimental findings in combination with thermodynamics and kinetics of the reactions involved in the anode, this paper presents a model featuring layered carbonization in the anode and relevant grouped equations. The simulation results generated from the latter are compared with experiments, and possible principles to suppress the performance loss …

Facile Synthesis Of Nitrogen-Doped Graphene-Like Active Carbon Materials For High Performance Lithium-Sulfur Battery, Quan-Hua Meng, Wen-Wen Deng, Chang-Ming Li

Journal of Electrochemistry

Lithium-sulphur (Li-S) battery is regarded as a promising energy storage device because of its high theoretical capacity. However, the low S utilization and short cycling life limit the commercial applications. In this work, nitrogen-doped graphene-like carbon (NGC) materials were synthesized by simply pyrolyzing and carbonizing the mixture of melamine (C₃H₆N₆) and L-cysteine (C₃H₇NO₂S). The graphene-like structure in NGC effectively buffered the volume change of S during the discharge/charge process and improved the cycling stability. Meanwhile, nitrogen-containing functional groups in NGC facilitated the transportation of ions and suppressed the …

Progress And Prospects On Multifunctional Coating Separators For Lithium-Sulfur Battery, Zhuang-Zhuang Wei, Nan-Xiang Zhang, Feng Wu, Ren-Jie Chen

Journal of Electrochemistry

The development of advanced energy storage systems is crucial to meet the growing demand for electric vehicles, portable devices and renewable energy storage. Lithium-sulfur (Li-S) batteries, with their advantages of high specific energy, low cost of raw materials and environmental friendliness, are hotspots in the research field of new high performance batteries. However, there are still many problems which hinder the practical applications of lithium-sulfur batteries, such as the shuttle effect of soluble polysulfide intermediates, the growth of lithium dendrites, and the thermal stability and safety of lithium-sulfur batteries during use. The design of multifunctional coating separator is one of …

Electrochemical Engineering Of Carbon Nanodots, Lei Bao, Dai-Wen Pang

Journal of Electrochemistry

Aqueous batteries have been considered to be a competitive candidate for large-scale energy storage. However, most of aqueous batteries adopt inorganic electrode materials with metallic elements, which are based on the reversible insertion of metal ions, making their application being highly hindered by limited cycle life, environmental issue, high cost and low reserves. On the other hand, organic electrode materials offer the advantages of abundant reserves, tunable structures, renewability and environmental benignity. Furthermore, the wide internal space enables these organics to flexibly store various charge carriers. Organics have been investigated as the alternative to inorganic electrode materials. Herein, we review …

Licoo2 As Sulfur Host To Enhance Cathode Volumetric Capacity For Lithium-Sulfur Battery, Lu Wang, Xue-Ping Gao

Journal of Electrochemistry

Lithium-sulfur battery is one of the most promising secondary battery systems due to its super high theoretical gravimetric and volumetric energy densities (2600 Wh·kg^-1 and 2800 Wh·L^-1, respectively). However, the practical volumetric capacity of sulfur cathode is still unsatisfied due to the overuse of low-density host materials, such as carbon nanomaterials. Herein, commercial LiCoO₂ with the high tap density of 2.94 g·cm^-3 was used as the host material to build high density sulfur-based composite and compact electrode for increasing the volumetric capacity. Obviously, the tap density of the as-prepared S/LiCoO₂ composite was 1.90 g·cm …

Research Progress Of Key Components In Lithium-Sulfur Batteries, Jia-Jia Chen, Quan-Feng Dong

Journal of Electrochemistry

Due to the much higher theoretical specific capacity and energy density than the ones of traditional lithium ion battery, Li-S batteries have long been at the pinnacle in the realms of high-energy Li-metal batteries. However, the complicated electrochemical reactions on the sulfur cathode and Li anode, induced by the thermodynamic and kinetic behaviors of lithium polysulfides, are the intrinsic bottleneck to realize the full potential of Li-S batteries for practical application. In this review, we firstly discuss the roles, and thermodynamic and kinetic behaviors of polysulfides in the charging and discharging processes of Li-S batteries. Then, the functional design and …

Research Progress Of Sulfur Cathode Catalytic Conversions For Lithium-Sulfur Batteries, Qin-Jun Shao, Jian Chen

Journal of Electrochemistry

The electrochemical reduction of sulfur (S) takes place through multistep reactions when S is used as a cathode material. The complete discharge of S to form final product lithium sulfide (Li₂S) is a two-electron reaction. The formation of low-order lithium polysulfides (LiPS) needs to overcome certain energy barriers. And the reduction of Li₂S₂ to Li₂S is the rate-limited step. The reaction kinetic of sulfur cathode is the critical key to determine the electrochemical performance of Li-S batteries, such as specific energy, specific power and low temperature performance, etc. Accelerating the rate-limited step kinetics …

Single‐Molecule 3d Orientation Imaging Reveals Nanoscale Compositional Heterogeneity In Lipid Membranes, Jin Lu, Hesam Mazidi, Tianben Ding, Oumeng Zhang, Matthew D. Lew

Electrical & Systems Engineering Publications and Presentations

In soft matter, thermal energy causes molecules to continuously translate and rotate, even in crowded environments, thereby impacting the spatial organization and function of most molecular assemblies, such as lipid membranes. Directly measuring the orientation and spatial organization of large collections (>3000 molecules μm⁻²) of single molecules with nanoscale resolution remains elusive. In this paper, we utilize SMOLM, single‐molecule orientation localization microscopy, to directly measure the orientation spectra (3D orientation plus “wobble”) of lipophilic probes transiently bound to lipid membranes, revealing that Nile red's (NR) orientation spectra are extremely sensitive to membrane chemical composition. SMOLM images resolve …

Inversion Modeling Of Japonica Rice Canopy Chlorophyll Content With Uav Hyperspectral Remote Sensing, Yingli Cao, Kailun Jiang, Jingxian Wu, Fenghua Yu, Wen Du, Tongyu Xu

Electrical Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations

Chlorophyll content is an important indicator of the growth status of japonica rice. The objective of this paper is to develop an inversion model that can predict japonica rice chlorophyll content by using hyperspectral image of rice canopy collected with unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV). UAV-based hyperspectral remote sensing can provide timely and cost-effective monitoring of chlorophyll content over a large region. The study was based on hyperspectral data collected at the Shenyang Agricultural College Academician Japonica Rice Experimental Base in 2018 and 2019. In order to extract the salient information embedded in the high-dimensional hyperspectral data, we first perform dimension …

Recent Progress In Bifunctional Catalysts For Zinc-Air Batteries, Neng-Neng Xu, Jin-Li Qiao

Journal of Electrochemistry

Zinc-air battery has attracted great attention from researchers due to its high energy density and power density, which is expected to be widely used in energy conversion and storage. Air electrode as the core area of oxygen catalytic reaction is the focus of the entire zinc-air battery research. Recently, many research achievements have been made in non-noble metal bifunctional catalysts/electrodes with high activity, low cost and abundant species. In this review, we mainly focus on the reaction mechanism and the recent progress in non-noble metal oxide catalyst, carbon-based catalyst, and carbon-based transition metal compound composite and self-supporting electrode. In addition, …

Research Progress Of Metal-Nitrogen-Carbon Catalysts Toward Oxygen Reduction Reaction Inm Changchun Institute Of Applied Chemistry, Ming-Jun Xu, Jie Liu, Jun-Jie Ge, Chang-Peng Liu, Wei Xing

Journal of Electrochemistry

The development of highly active and stable catalysts toward oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) has been facing severe challenges. In recent years, pyrolytic M-N-C catalysts and metal-organic framework derived materials made the performance of non-noble metal catalysts greatly improved, however, the molecular and atomic level understanding in the reaction active sites and the mechanism are still lacking. Here, we summarize the recent research progress made in the Changchun Institute of Applied Chemistry. We present a microporous metal-organic-framework confined strategy toward the preferable formation of ORR catalysts. Firstly, we studied the active site and proposed a new active site structure for the …

Electrochemical Carbon Dioxide Reduction In Flow Cells, Jia Fan, Na Han, Yan-Guang Li

Journal of Electrochemistry

Electrochemical carbon dioxide reduction (CO₂RR) is an appealing approach to convert atmospheric CO₂ to value-added fuels and industrial chemicals, and may play an important role during the transition to a carbon-neutral economy. In order to make this technology commercially viable, it is essential to pursue CO₂RR in flow reactors instead of conventional H-type reactors, and to combine electrocatalyst development with system engineering. In this review, we overview the cell configurations and performance advantages of the two types of flow reactors, analyze their shortcomings, and discuss the effects of their different components including gas diffusion electrode …

Electrolyte Tailoring For Electrocatalytic Reduction Of Stable Molecules, Jin-Han Li, Fang-Yi Cheng

Journal of Electrochemistry

Reduction of stable molecules such as CO₂ and N₂ is important process in electrochemical energy conversion and storage technologies for electrofuels production. However, for the inert nature of CO₂/N₂ molecule and competitive proton reduction in conventional aqueous electrolytes, selective electrochemical carbon/nitrogen fixation suffers from high overpotential, low reaction rate and low selectivity. While addressing these issues has witnessed substantial advances in electrocatalysts, much less attention has been placed on the electrolytes, which play an important role in regulating the local environment and thus the performance of catalysts under operating conditions. Rational design of electrolytes has …

Fuel Cell Performance Of Non-Precious Metal Based Electrocatalysts, Yan-Feng Zhang, Fei Xiao, Guang-Yu Chen, Min-Hua Shao

Journal of Electrochemistry

The commercialization of proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs) is hindered by high cost and low durability of Pt based electrocatalysts. Developing efficient and durable non-precious metal catalysts is a promising approach to addressing these conundrums. Among them, transition metals dispersed in a nitrogen (N)-doped carbon support (M-N-C) show good oxygen reduction reaction activity. This article reviews recent progress in M-N-C catalysts development, focusing on the catalysts design, membrane electrode assembly fabrication, fuel cell performance, and durability testing. Template-assisted approach is an efficient way to synthesize M-N-C materials with homogeneously dispersed single atom active site and reduced metal particles, carbides …

A Review Of Electrochemical Energy Storage Researches In The Past 22 Years, Yu-Sheng Yang

Journal of Electrochemistry

In this paper, research activities from my groups in the field of electrochemical energy storage are reviewed for the past 22 years, which is divided into three sections. The first section describes the researches related to high specific energy and high specific power energy storage devices, including lithium sulfur batteriies (sulfur composite cathode material, lithium sulfur battery fabrication, lithium boron alloy as lithium sulfur battery anodes, and sulfur lithium-ion battery new system), supercapacitors (super activated carbon, capacitive carbon prepared from phenolic resin, carbon nanotube array parasitic pseudo-capacitive energy storage materials, necessary properties of capacitive carbons, nickel hydroxide xerogels pseudo-capacitive energy …

Recent Progress On Enhancing Effect Of Nanosized Metals For Electrochemical Co2 Reduction, Yu-Ning Zhang, Dong-Fang Niu, Shuo-Zhen Hu, Xin-Sheng Zhang

Journal of Electrochemistry

The electrochemical conversion of CO₂ to chemical raw material for further utilization shows promising future to alleviate global warming and realize carbon cycle in nature, which is of great significance to the green chemistry and sustainable development. This review briefly introduces the advantages of CO₂ electrochemical reduction (CO₂ER) and its basic reaction principles, and summarizes the recent progress in a series of activity enhancement strategies based on nanosized metal catalysts. The influences of alloy effect, interface engineering, synergistic effect, surface defect engineering and support effect on the catalytic performance of nanosized metals for CO₂ER …

Structural Organization And Chemical Activity Revealed By New Developments In Single-Molecule Fluorescence And Orientation Imaging, Tianben Ding

McKelvey School of Engineering Graduate Student Theses & Dissertations

Single-molecule (SM) fluorescence and its localization are important and versatile tools for understanding and quantifying dynamical nanoscale behavior of nanoparticles and biological systems. By actively controlling the concentration of fluorescent molecules and precisely localizing individual single molecules, it is possible to overcome the classical diffraction limit and achieve 'super-resolution' with image resolution on the order of 10 nanometers.

Single molecules also can be considered as nanoscale sensors since their fluorescence changes in response to their local nanoenvironment. This dissertation discusses extending this SM approach to resolve heterogeneity and dynamics of nanoscale materials and biophysical structures by using positions and orientations …

Investigation Of The Structural, Electronic, And Thermoelectric Properties Of Mono- Chalcogenides, Aida Sheibani

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The structural, electronic, and thermoelectric properties of GeTe are studied using density functional theory and Boltzmann transport equations. This material has a rhombohedral crystal structure in ambient temperature with a ferroelectric behavior due to lack of inversion symmetry. This study suggests that the presence of asymmetry in GeTe can lead to an improvement in the thermoelectric properties of this material. In addition, studies on introducing Group III, IV, and V dopants to GeSe show that while these impurities can improve the power factor and decrease the lattice thermal conductivity, they cannot enhance the figure of merit.

Three-Event Energy Detection With Adaptive Threshold For Spectrum Sensing In Cognitive Radio Systems, Alexandru Martian, Mahmood Jalal Ahmad Al Sammarraie, Calin Vladeanu, Dimitrie Popescu

Electrical & Computer Engineering Faculty Publications

Implementation of dynamic spectrum access (DSA) in cognitive radio (CR) systems requires the unlicensed secondary users (SU) to implement spectrum sensing to monitor the activity of the licensed primary users (PU). Energy detection (ED) is one of the most widely used methods for spectrum sensing in CR systems, and in this paper we present a novel ED algorithm with an adaptive sensing threshold. The three-event ED (3EED) algorithm for spectrum sensing is considered for which an accurate approximation of the optimal decision threshold that minimizes the decision error probability (DEP) is found using Newton’s method with forced convergence in one …

The Interaction Of Ternary Components Of Ionic Liquid Gel Polymer Electrolytes For Lithium Metal Batteries, Xiao-Na Pan, Li-Lai Liu, Zhi-Pu Wang, Dan Wang, Yun Li, Pei-Xia Yang, Jin-Qiu Zhang, Mao-Zhong An

Journal of Electrochemistry

Ionically conductive gel polymer electrolyte is an excellent candidate due to its inflammable, nonvolatile and high thermal stability as compared to commercial liquid electrolytes which are usually flammable, volatile, and containing toxic organic solution as solvent, The synthesis and application of ionic gel polymer electrolytes in lithium ion/metal batteries have been previously reported. However, the interaction effects of N-methyl-N-propylpiperidinium bis(trifluoromethanesulfonyl)imide (PP13TFSI) ionic liquid (as plasticizer) and lithium bis(trifluoromethanesulfonyl)imide (LiTFSI) on PVDF-HFP polymer remain unclear. In this work, the molecular structure of ionic liquid gel polymer electrolyte (ILGPE) composed of PP13TFSI, LiTFSI and PVDF-HFP was studied by Raman spectroscopy and Fourier-transform …

Electrochemical Oxidation Of Metal Chromium In Odium Hydroxide Aqueous Solution, Ping Han, Hai-Tao Feng, Ya-Ping Dong, Sen Tian, Bo Zhang, Wu Li

Journal of Electrochemistry

Ferrochrome electrolysis technology is a novel method for preparing sodium chromate (Na₂CrO₄). Although the method performs well at soft reaction conditions, controllable process, environmentally friendly production process, etc., the electrochemical oxidation process of metal chromium in NaOH aqueous electrolyte is still unclear. At present, there are few research articles about specific electrochemical oxidation of metal chromium in NaOH aqueous electrolyte. It is, therefore, meaningful to carry out the research in electrochemical oxidation mechanism of chromium. The electrochemical oxidation of metal chromium in 0.01 mol·L^-1 ~ 10 mol·L^-1 NaOH aqueous electrolytes at 20 °C was …