Publications

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Affordable clean water is both a global and a national security issue as lack of it can cause death, disease, and international tension. Furthermore, efficient water filtration reduces the demand for energy, another national issue. The best current solution to clean water lies in reverse osmosis (RO) membranes that remove salts from water with applied pressure, but widely used polymeric membrane technology is energy intensive and produces water depleted in useful electrolytes. Furthermore incremental improvements, based on engineering solutions rather than new materials, have yielded only modest gains in performance over the last 25 years. We have pursued a creative and innovative new approach to membrane design and development for cheap desalination membranes by approaching the problem at the molecular level of pore design. Our inspiration comes from natural biological channels, which permit faster water transport than current reverse osmosis membranes and selectively pass healthy ions. Aiming for an order-of-magnitude improvement over mature polymer technology carries significant inherent risks. The success of our fundamental research effort lies in our exploiting, extending, and integrating recent advances by our team in theory, modeling, nano-fabrication and platform development. A combined theoretical and experimental platform has been developed to understand the interplay between water flux and ion rejection in precisely-defined nano-channels. Our innovative functionalization of solid state nanoporous membranes with organic protein-mimetic polymers achieves 3-fold improvement in water flux over commercial RO membranes and has yielded a pending patent and industrial interest. Our success has generated useful contributions to energy storage, nanoscience, and membrane technology research and development important for national health and prosperity.

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We perform pressure-driven non-equilibrium molecular dynamics (MD) simulations to drive a 1.0 M NaCI electrolyte through a dipole-lined smooth nanopore of diameter 12 A penetrating a model membrane. We show that partial, about 70-80%, CI- rejection is achieved at a ~68 atmosphere pressure. At the high water flux achieved in these model nanopores, which are particularly pertinent to atomistically smooth carbon nanotube membranes that permit fast water transport, the ion rejection ratio decreases with increasing water flux. The computed potential of mean force of Cl- frozen inside the nanopore reveals a barrier of 6.4 kcal/mol in 1.0 M NaCI solution. The Cl- permeation occurs despite the barrier, and this is identified as a dynamical effect, with ions carried along by the water flux. Na +-CI- ion-pairing or aggregation near the pore entrance and inside the pore, where the dielectric screening is weaker than in bulk water, is critical to Cl- permeation. We also consider negative charges decorating the rim and the interior of the pore instead of dipoles, and find that, with sufficient pressure, CI- from a 1.0 M NaCI solution readily passes through such nanopores. © 2009 American Scientific Publishers.

This report focuses on quantum chemistry and ab initio molecular dynamics (AIMD) calculations applied to elucidate the mechanism of the multi-step, 2-electron, electrochemical reduction of the green house gas molecule carbon dioxide (CO{sub 2}) to carbon monoxide (CO) in aqueous media. When combined with H{sub 2} gas to form synthesis ('syn') gas, CO becomes a key precursor to methane, methanol, and other useful hydrocarbon products. To elucidate the mechanism of this reaction, we apply computational electrochemistry which is a fledgling, important area of basic science critical to energy storage. This report highlights several approaches, including the calculation of redox potentials, the explicit depiction of liquid water environments using AIMD, and free energy methods. While costly, these pioneering calculations reveal the key role of hydration- and protonation-stabilization of reaction intermediates, and may inform the design of CO{sub 2}-capture materials as well as its electrochemical reduction. In the course of this work, we have also dealt with the challenges of identifying and applying electronic structure methods which are sufficiently accurate to deal with transition metal ion complex-based catalyst. Such electronic structure methods are also pertinent to the accurate modeling of actinide materials and therefore to nuclear energy research. Our multi-pronged effort towards achieving this titular goal of the LDRD is discussed.

Room temperature radiolysis, density functional theory, and various nanoscale characterization methods were used to synthesize and fully describe Ni-based alloy nanoparticles (NPs) that were synthesized at room temperature. These complementary methods provide a strong basis in understanding and describing metastable phase regimes of alloy NPs whose reaction formation is determined by kinetic rather than thermodynamic reaction processes. Four series of NPs, (Ag-Ni, Pd-Ni, Co-Ni, and W-Ni) were analyzed and characterized by a variety of methods, including UV-vis, TEM/HRTEM, HAADF-STEM and EFTEM mapping. In the first focus of research, AgNi and PdNi were studied. Different ratios of Ag{sub x}- Ni{sub 1-x} alloy NPs and Pd{sub 0.5}- Ni{sub 0.5} alloy NP were prepared using a high dose rate from gamma irradiation. Images from high-angle annular dark-field (HAADF) show that the Ag-Ni NPs are not core-shell structure but are homogeneous alloys in composition. Energy filtered transmission electron microscopy (EFTEM) maps show the homogeneity of the metals in each alloy NP. Of particular interest are the normally immiscible Ag-Ni NPs. All evidence confirmed that homogeneous Ag-Ni and Pd-Ni alloy NPs presented here were successfully synthesized by high dose rate radiolytic methodology. A mechanism is provided to explain the homogeneous formation of the alloy NPs. Furthermore, studies of Pd-Ni NPs by in situ TEM (with heated stage) shows the ability to sinter these NPs at temperatures below 800 C. In the second set of work, CoNi and WNi superalloy NPs were attempted at 50/50 concentration ratios using high dose rates from gamma irradiation. Preliminary results on synthesis and characterization have been completed and are presented. As with the earlier alloy NPs, no evidence of core-shell NP formation occurs. Microscopy results seem to indicate alloying occurred with the CoNi alloys. However, there appears to be incomplete reduction of the Na{sub 2}WO{sub 4} to form the W{sup 2+} ion in solution; the predominance of WO{sup +} appears to have resulted in a W-O-Ni complex that has not yet been fully characterized.

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This one-year exploratory LDRD aims to provide fundamental understanding of the mechanism of CO₂ scrubbing platforms that will reduce green house gas emission and mitigate the effect of climate change. The project builds on the team member's expertise developed in previous LDRD projects to study the capture or preferential retention of CO₂ in nanoporous membranes and on metal oxide surfaces. We apply Density Functional Theory and ab initio molecular dynamics techniques to model the binding of CO₂ on MgO and CaO (100) surfaces and inside water-filled, amine group functionalized silica nanopores. The results elucidate the mechanisms of CO₂ trapping and clarify some confusion in the literature. Our work identifies key future calculations that will have the greatest impact on CO₂ capture technologies, and provides guidance to science-based design of platforms that can separate the green house gas CO₂ from power plant exhaust or even from the atmosphere. Experimentally, we modify commercial MFI zeolite membranes and find that they preferentially transmit H₂ over CO₂ by a factor of 34. Since zeolite has potential catalytic capability to crack hydrocarbons into CO₂ and H₂, this finding paves the way for zeolite membranes that can convert biofuel into H₂ and separate the products all in one step.

A molecular-scale interpretation of interfacial processes is often downplayed in the analysis of traditional water treatment methods. However, such an approach is critical for the development of enhanced performance in traditional desalination and water treatments. Water confined between surfaces, within channels, or in pores is ubiquitous in technology and nature. Its physical and chemical properties in such environments are unpredictably different from bulk water. As a result, advances in water desalination and purification methods may be accomplished through an improved analysis of water behavior in these challenging environments using state-of-the-art microscopy, spectroscopy, experimental, and computational methods.

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