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Now showing 1 - 10 of 15
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    Wet-Spun PEDOT/CNT Composite Hollow Fibers as Flexible Electrodes for H2O2 Production
    (Weinheim : Wiley-VCH, 2021) Cui, Qing; Bell, Daniel Josef; Wang, Siqi; Mohseni, Mojtaba; Felder, Daniel; Lölsberg, Jonas; Wessling, Matthias
    The electrochemical synthesis of hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) using the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) requires highly catalytic active, selective, and stable electrode materials to realize a green and efficient process. The present publication shows for the first time the application of a facile one-step bottom-up wet-spinning approach for the continuous fabrication of stable and flexible tubular poly(3,4-ethylene dioxythiophene) (PEDOT : PSS) and PEDOT : PSS/carbon nanotube (CNT) hollow fibers. Additionally, electrochemical experiments reveal the catalytic activity of acid-treated PEDOT : PSS and its composites in the ORR forming hydrogen peroxide for the first time. Under optimized conditions, the composite electrodes with 40 wt % CNT loading could achieve a high production rate of 0.01 mg/min/cm2 and a current efficiency of up to 54 %. In addition to the high production rate, the composite hollow fiber has proven its long-term stability with 95 % current retention after 20 h of hydrogen peroxide production. © 2021 The Authors. ChemElectroChem published by Wiley-VCH GmbH
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    High-Throughput Production of Micrometer Sized Double Emulsions and Microgel Capsules in Parallelized 3D Printed Microfluidic Devices
    (Basel : MDPI, 2019) Jans, Alexander; Lölsberg, Jonas; Omidinia-Anarkoli, Abdolrahman; Viermann, Robin; Möller, Martin; De Laporte, Laura; Wessling, Matthias; Kuehne, Alexander J. C.
    Double emulsions are useful geometries as templates for core-shell particles, hollow sphere capsules, and for the production of biomedical delivery vehicles. In microfluidics, two approaches are currently being pursued for the preparation of microfluidic double emulsion devices. The first approach utilizes soft lithography, where many identical double-flow-focusing channel geometries are produced in a hydrophobic silicone matrix. This technique requires selective surface modification of the respective channel sections to facilitate alternating wetting conditions of the channel walls to obtain monodisperse double emulsion droplets. The second technique relies on tapered glass capillaries, which are coaxially aligned, so that double emulsions are produced after flow focusing of two co-flowing streams. This technique does not require surface modification of the capillaries, as only the continuous phase is in contact with the emulsifying orifice; however, these devices cannot be fabricated in a reproducible manner, which results in polydisperse double emulsion droplets, if these capillary devices were to be parallelized. Here, we present 3D printing as a means to generate four identical and parallelized capillary device architectures, which produce monodisperse double emulsions with droplet diameters in the range of 500 µm. We demonstrate high throughput synthesis of W/O/W and O/W/O double emulsions, without the need for time-consuming surface treatment of the 3D printed microfluidic device architecture. Finally, we show that we can apply this device platform to generate hollow sphere microgels.
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    Tubular hollow fibre electrodes for CO2 reduction made from copper aluminum alloy with drastically increased intrinsic porosity
    (Amsterdam [u.a.] : Elsevier Science, 2020) Bell, Daniel; Rall, Deniz; Großeheide, Maren; Marx, Lennart; Hülsdünker, Laura; Wessling, Matthias
    Electrochemical reduction of CO2 to higher-order hydrocarbon products offers a significant contribution to the challenge of a circular economy. In the pursuit of better copper metal catalyst, it was early on realized that increasing productivity of copper catalysts systems is reliant on high surface area per volume. Tubular gas diffusion electrodes offer such properties. In this work, we present a methodology to fabricate tubular hollow fibre copper electrodes with drastically increased intrinsic porosity. Our described method utilizes a standard dealloying process of copper aluminium particles to induce an intra-particle nanoporosity. The specific surface area increases from 0.126 m2 g−1 before dealloying to 6.194 m2 g−1 after dealloying. In comparison to conventional planar copper electrodes and literature data from conventional copper hollow fibres, the intra-particle porosity leads to a drastically increase in electrochemical activity. Electrochemical measurements reveal increased current densities at low over-potentials in comparison to conventional copper electrodes under identical experimental conditions emphasizing the significant impact of the porosity on the electrode performance. The presented method can be easily transferred to other alloy particles, highlighting its versatility for electrode fabrication. © 2019 The Author(s)
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    Polymeric Membranes With Sufficient Thermo‐Mechanical Stability to Deploy Temperature Enhanced Backwash
    (Weinheim : Wiley-VCH, 2021) Aumeier, Benedikt M.; Vollmer, Fabian; Lenfers, Simon; Yüce, Süleyman; Wessling, Matthias
    The alternative membrane cleaning method Temperature Enhanced Backwash exploits elevated temperatures of typically 125 °C to realize high shear rate. This exceeds usual operating temperatures by far. Therefore, the thermo-mechanical properties of polymeric membranes were investigated. A repeated load cycle testing was suited and sensitive to detect the failure of membrane material and potting. All tested PES membranes showed to be stable during the repeated load cycle testing. The potting adhesive may be decisive, thus, a tensile test at 125 °C is proposed. © 2021 The Authors. Chemie Ingenieur Technik published by Wiley-VCH GmbH
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    On the Resistances of a Slurry Electrode Vanadium Redox Flow Battery
    (Weinheim : Wiley-VCH, 2020) Percin, Korcan; van der Zee, Bart; Wessling, Matthias
    We studied the half-cell performance of a slurry-based vanadium redox flow battery via the polarization and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy methods. First, the conductive static mixers are examined and lower ohmic and diffusion resistances are shown. Further analyses of the slurry electrodes for the catholyte (VO2+−VO2 +) and anolyte (V3+−V2+) are presented for the graphite powder slurry containing up to 15.0 wt.% particle content. Overall, the anolyte persists as the more resistive half-cell, while ohmic and diffusion-related limitations are the dominating resistances for both electrolytes. The battery is further improved by the addition of Ketjen black nanoparticles, which results in lower cell resistances. The best results are achieved when 0.5 wt.% Ketjen black nanoparticles are dispersed with graphite powder since the addition of nanoparticles reduces ohmic, charge transfer and mass diffusion resistances by improving particle-particle dynamics. The results prove the importance of understanding resistances in a slurry electrode system. © 2020 The Authors. Published by Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA.
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    Titanium-Based Static Mixer Electrodes to Improve the Current Density of Slurry Electrodes
    (Weinheim : Wiley-VCH, 2023) Percin, Korcan; Hereijgers, Jonas; Mulandi, Nicolas; Breugelmans, Tom; Wessling, Matthias
    Complex geometries for electrodes are a great challenge in electrochemical applications. Slurry electrodes have been one example, which use complex flow distributors to improve the charge transfer between the current collector and the slurry particles. Here we use titanium-based flow distributors produced by indirect 3D-printing to improve further the electron transfer from highly conductive flow distributors to the slurry particles for a vanadium redox flow application. The titanium static mixers are directly coated with graphite to increase the activity for vanadium redox reactions. Increasing layers of graphite have shown an optimum for the positive and negative electrolytes. The application of heat treatment on the electrodes improves the anodic and cathodic current peaks drastically. Testing the highly conductive static mixers in a self-made redox flow cell results in 110 mA cm−2 discharge polarization.
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    Co-generation of Ammonia and H2 from H2O Vapor and N2 Using a Membrane Electrode Assembly
    (Weinheim : Wiley-VCH, 2020) Kugler, Kurt; Kriescher, Stefanie M.A.; Giela, Martin; Hosseiny, Schwan; Thimm, Kristof; Wessling, Matthias
    The direct electrochemical synthesis of NH3 from nitrogen and water vapor without the use of a fossil carbon source is highly desired. This synthesis is a viable option to store energy and produce fertilizer precursors. Here, a new Pt-free membrane electrode assembly is presented. An electrochemical membrane reactor demonstrates the feasibility of co-generating NH3 and H2 directly from nitrogen and water vapor at ambient conditions. An unprecedented high NH3-specific current efficiency of up to 27.5% using Ti as cathodic catalyst is reported. The co-generation can be tuned by the balance of process parameters. © 2019 The Authors. Published by WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim
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    A Tubular Electrochemical Reactor for Slurry Electrodes
    (Weinheim : Wiley-VCH, 2020) Percin, Korcan; Zoellner, Oliver; Rall, Deniz; Wessling, Matthias
    The research on electrochemical reactors is mostly limited to planarly designed modules. In this study, we compare a tubular and a planar electrochemical reactor for the utilization of the slurry electrodes. Cylindrical formed geometries demonstrate a higher surface-to-volume ratio, which may be favorable in terms of current density and volumetric power density. A tubular shaped electrochemical reactor is designed with conductive static mixers to promote the slurry particle mixing, and the vanadium redox flow battery is selected as a showcase application. The new tubular design presents similar cell resistances to the previously designed planar battery and shows increased discharge polarization behavior up to 100 mA cm−2. The volumetric power density reaches up to 30 mW cm−3, which is two times higher than that of the planar one. The battery performance is further investigated and 85 % coulombic, 70 % voltage and 60 % energy efficiency is found at 15 mA cm−2 with 15 wt.% slurry content. © 2020 The Authors. Published by Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA.
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    Atomic layer deposition for efficient oxygen evolution reaction at Pt/Ir catalyst layers
    (Frankfurt, M. : Beilstein-Institut zur Förderung der Chemischen Wissenschaften, 2020) Schlicht, Stefanie; Percin, Korcan; Kriescher, Stefanie; Hofer, André; Weidlich, Claudia; Wessling, Matthias; Bachmann, Julien
    We provide a direct comparison of two distinct methods of Ti felt surface treatment and Pt/Ir electrocatalyst deposition for the positive electrode of regenerative fuel cells and vanadium-air redox flow batteries. Each method is well documented in the literature, and this paper provides a direct comparison under identical experimental conditions of electrochemical measurements and in identical units. In the first method, based on classical engineering, the bimetallic catalyst is deposited by dip-coating in a precursor solution of the salts followed by their thermal decomposition. In the alternative method, more academic in nature, atomic layer deposition (ALD) is applied to the felts after anodization. ALD allows for a controlled coating with ultralow noble-metal loadings in narrow pores. In acidic electrolyte, the ALD approach yields improved mass activity (557 A·g-1 as compared to 80 A·g-1 at 0.39 V overpotential) on the basis of the noble-metal loading, as well as improved stability. © 2020 Schlicht et al.
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    Homogeneous Catalyst Recycling and Separation of a Multicomponent Mixture Using Organic Solvent Nanofiltration
    (Weinheim : Wiley-VCH, 2019) Schnoor, Johann-Kilian; Fuchs, Martin; Böcking, Axel; Wessling, Matthias; Liauw, Marcel A.
    In homogeneous catalysis, the application of organic solvent nanofiltration (OSN) has become a well-known alternative to common recycling methods. Even though some OSN membranes are commercially available, their classification and the scope of application have to be determined for the specific solvent mixture. The commercial membrane Evoniks DuraMem® 300 was tested in a mixture of ethanol, ethyl acetate, and cyclohexane with magnesium triflate as possible catalyst. The cross permeate fluxes were measured for two transmembrane pressures and the hydrodynamic radii of the components were determined. Some of the components in the ternary mixture are retained, which makes the membrane also suitable for fractioning thereof. © 2019 The Authors. Published by WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim