Skip to main content

Materials: in-depth understanding, design and applications

QUICK INFORMATION
Type
Seminar
Start Date
19-11-2018 10:00
End Date
19-11-2018 11:00
Location
Room 500 - 501, Central Building
Speaker's name
Simon CHAMPET
Speaker's institute
University of Glasgow, UK
Contact name
Anaïs Fernandes
Host name
Marine Cotte - Tobias Schulli
Add event to calendar
iCal | vCal

Materials are widely present in “daily life” as they are present in food and tires industries, as well as in catalysis, battery and hydrogen storage sectors, and also – more specific but of growing technological importance - in semiconductors. Understanding the intrinsic properties of the materials, their interactions with the environment and controlling their (nano)structures are crucial for the development of durable applications.

 

One first example of aluminosilicate materials will be presented. In this project, hierarchical porous materials for biomass catalytic conversion were studied, from the synthesis and characterisation of the catalyst with 3D interconnected porosity to their catalytic activity (conversion yield and selectivity). With a relatively good conversion yield, the developed materials show higher selectivity towards specific molecules such as toluene (+ 11%) and p - xylene (+22 %) compared to neat zeolite.

A second project, part of my PhD, describes the preparation and characterisation of graphene-derived composites with ammonia borane or metal borohydride-based materials as hydrogen store. Hydrogen compounds (including metal hydrides, complexes and boron nitrogen hydrides) are known for their high gravimetric density (attractive candidates for hydrogen storage) but also for their air sensitivity and/or toxic by-products. We focus here on the nanoconfinement approach to tackle these drawbacks. Our host material is a new, porous graphene-derived material which acts so as to lower the dehydrogenation temperature and enhance the selectivity of the released gas. Our results demonstrate that nanocomposites confining ammonia borane (AB) into graphene oxide (GO) 3D structures of controlled radial porosity lead to the elimination of classic AB by-products such as borazine and diborane. The high purity hydrogen can thus be stored at gravimetric density exceeding most metal hydrides with a release onset temperature lower than 100 °C.

 

Characterisation methods such as X-ray and neutron diffraction (and crystal structure refinement), Infrared, Raman and UV-Visible spectroscopy, electron microscopy (SEM, STEM, TEM, EDS, AFM, SAED), were performed on different types of materials (ceramics, carbon-based, crystals, air-sensitive…). The obtained skills on such techniques are proposed to be used in the ESRF Post-Doc position to analyse nanostructures and behaviours of the crystalline layers (e.g. Silicon-Germanium thin materials) under extreme deformation.

Therefore, the expertise I acquired will be constructive for this post-doc fellowship (on both materials preparation/characterisation and scale-up points of view) and I will be an active member of the team.

Visitors from off-site please contact Anaïs Fernandes tel +33 (0)438 88 19 92 to arrange for a gate pass.
Requests made by e-mail will be confirmed.
If you do not receive a confirmation e-mail, please contact us by phone.