bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Capacitive Deionization Performance of Thermally Surface Modified Activated Carbon Cloth Electrodes
Authors: Agartan Lutfi , Akuzum Bilen , Mathis Tyler , Ergenekon Kurtay , Agar Ertan , Gogotsi Yury , Kumbur E. Caglan 
Published: February 2020

Capacitive deionization (CDI) is a low energy desalination technology with long-cycle life, which utilizes high-porosity capacitive electrodes for capturing ions from flowing saline water [1, 2]. Though still suffering from relatively low desalination capacity, one major advantage of CDI technology is its low energy requirement and high rate operation for desalination. In recent years, much effort has been put on improving electrode materials for CDI applications. These studies have mostly focused either on the use of novel electrode materials or on surface modifications (e.g. metal oxide growth, chemical treatment, and thermal treatment) of the existing CDI electrode materials [1, 3, 4].
Although thermal treatment of carbon electrodes for improved charge storage is a well-established approach, the effects of various thermal treatment procedures on the performance of CDI electrodes still remain unexplored. Inherent similarities between the operating principles of supercapacitors and CDI technology might make one to think a similar correlation could be established between thermal treatment and the CDI performance. However, due to major differences in required charge storage mechanisms, a detailed study on various treatment conditions should be conducted to understand which conditions specifically promote better ion adsorption in CDI electrodes.
Motivated by this, the effects of different thermal treatment conditions (i.e., temperature and gases) on salt adsorption performances of the activated carbon cloth (ACC) electrodes were investigated. Major discrepancy between stored charge versus salt adsorption capacity (SAC) was observed for different treatment conditions. To better assess these effects, additional BET and Raman tests on the ACC electrodes were also conducted. Results indicated interesting observations regarding charge storage capacity and SAC for different treatment conditions, which highlights the importance of selecting a suitable thermal treatment condition for enhancing the CDI performance of ACC electrodes.

References

[1] S. Porada, R. Zhao, A. van der Wal, V. Presser and P.M. Biesheuvel, Progress in Materials Science, 2013, 58(8), 1388-1442.
[2] T. J. Welgemoed and C.F. Schutte, Desalination, 2005, 183(1-3), 327-340.
[3] L. G. Zou, G. Morris and D. Qi, Desalination, 2008, 225(1-3), 329-340.
[4] M. E. Suss, S. Porada, X. Sun, P. M. Biesheuvel, J. Yoon and V. Presser, Energy and Environmental Science, 2015, 8(8), 2296-2319.
Evaluation of Non-Adiabatic Thermodynamic Cycles for Electroadsorption Based Deionization
Authors: Zhang Jiankai , Nazemi Mohammadreza , Hatzell Marta C. 
Published: February 2020

There is a large push to develop appropriate technologies to treat not only seawater but brackish waters in order to increase the availability of water. Brackish water treatment requires significantly less energy than seawater desalination. To put the energy demand into perspective, the thermodynamic minimum energy require for separation, estimated by the Gibbs free energy of mixing, is between 1-3 kWh per m3 for seawater (35 g/l) and only 0.2-0.9 kWh per m3 for brackish streams (5 g/l). This energy savings quickly compounds at industrial and power generation sites which require over 1 billion m3 of water daily1. Furthermore, brackish waters are not geographically limited, available at both coastal and non-coastal regions.
The treatment of brackish rather than seawater can yield energy savings; however, achieving high energy efficiency during low saline separations processes remains a significant challenge. This has been demonstrated using state of the art desalination technology (reverse osmosis and distillation) that in general thermodynamic efficiencies are low (~5%)2. Furthermore, most common desalination technologies require additional components (heat or pressure exchangers) to recover energy. One emerging technology which aims to improve thermodynamic efficiencies associated with brackish water and simultaneously has the capability to recovery energy is termed capacitive deionization (CDI)3. CDI removes minority ions from a mixture through electroadsorbing the charged constituents when a potential is applied across an electrochemical cell. The ions stored in the electric double layer (EDL) can then be discharged into a brine solution to regenerate active surface area. During this discharge process energy can be recovered. To date, the majority of CDI energy efficiency studies have focused on evaluating systems levels losses associated with the materials, or have evaluated individual processes (charge or discharge) in order to improve performance. While optimizing individual processes provides significant insight into mechanistic losses, evaluating a complete cycle is critical in order to evaluate 2nd law limitations. Here we will evaluate the challenges associated with discharging into a brine solution, and the potential energetic and exegetic savings which can occur through non-adiabatic system operation.

Maupin, Molly A., et al. Estimated use of water in the United States in 2010. No. 1405. US Geological Survey, 2014.

Demirel, Yaşar. "Thermodynamic analysis of separation systems." Separation science and technology 39, no. 16 (2004): 3897-3942.

Hatzell, Kelsey B., Marta C. Hatzell, Kevin M. Cook, Muhammad Boota, Gabrielle M. Housel, Alexander McBride, E. Caglan Kumbur, and Yury Gogotsi. "Effect of oxidation of carbon material on suspension electrodes for flow electrode capacitive deionization." Environmental science & technology 49, no. 5 (2015): 3040-3047.
Sustainable Autarky of Food-Energy-Water (SAFE-Water)
Authors: Chaitanya V. , Gedara S , Karbakhshi M , Khandan N 
Published: February 2020

With nearly 70% of the world population already concentrated in towns and cities, and with continuing trends in population growth and sprawl of metropolitan areas, provision of the basic human needs of food, energy, and water to the inhabitants is seen as a major challenge. Being net consumers of food, energy, and water, current urban infrastructure that continues to rely on obsolete technologies to provide these basic needs is not sustainable. Development of modern infrastructure that can recover and recycle energy and materials within the food-energy-water (FEW) sectors of urban sprawl is now recognized as one of the best options to improve the sustainability of both urban and agricultural systems.
In this paper, we report on algal-based, photosynthetically oxygenated waste-to-energy recovery (POWER®) system for recovering energy, water, and nutrients from urban wastewaters (UWW) that can be utilized in the food production sector. The POWER® system affords waste treatment, net energy production, and recovery of irrigation-quality water and high-purity crop fertilizers. The strain used in the POWER® system is Galdieria sulphuraria, capable of mixotrophic growth under elevated temperatures of 45 - 55oC and low pH of 2 - 4. The POWER® system provides single-step removal of carbon and nutrients (nitrogen, N and phosphates, P) from UWWs through mixotrophic metabolism. The mixotrophic algal system is capable of incorporating all the C, N, and P in UWW into biomass without any energy input and without any loss of C as CO2 as is the case in the current activated sludge systems. In addition, solar energy captured via photosynthesis is also incorporated into the biomass. The energy-rich biomass is then hydrothermally processed in the POWER® system to yield biocrude and biochar with solubilized N and P in concentrated form as byproducts for recovery and use as fertilizers. This paper includes details of development of the POWER® system and results from a pilot scale study conducted under field conditions at an urban wastewater treatment plant.
(Invited) DOE’s Approach to the Energy Water Nexus: New Opportunities and Solutions
Authors: Ivester Robert 
Published: February 2020

Energy and water systems are interdependent. Water is used in all phases of energy production and electricity generation. Similarly, energy is required to extract, convey, and deliver water of an appropriate quality for a range of uses. Because of these interdependencies, problems in one system can affect the other. For example, severe drought can limit water availability and constrain output from some power plants. Major storms and other disruptions can knock out power supplies to vital water infrastructure and lead to public health threats. Meanwhile, as population grows and traditional water sources become a less sustainable option, the demand for clean water from nontraditional sources that require more energy to produce are expected to grow.
The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has been focusing its science, technology, and analytic capabilities to help the nation move to more resilient energy-water systems. This presentation will address two technology topic areas the Department has been active in: treatment of non-traditional water; and advancing sustainable water utilities. Specifically, DOE has been seeking to resolve the manufacturing challenges that currently prevent the production of clean water from non-traditional sources at a cost competitive with traditional water supplies. DOE has been working with public and private partners to advance technological innovation and address barriers to help water and wastewater treatment systems transition to sustainable water utilities with low energy costs and reduced environmental impacts. These technology topic areas have been pursued as part of a broader Department-wide strategy on the energy-water nexus, stemming from the Department’s foundational 2014 report, “The Water-Energy Nexus: Challenges and Opportunities.”
(Invited) Neuroengineering Overview
Authors: Shemesh Or A , Boyden Edward S 
Published: February 2020

Neuroengineering, the field of creating new tools for neuroscience, is an emerging field which includes the invention of technologies to activate and silence electrical activity in the brain, technologies to read out electrical activity from cells in the brain, and tools for mapping the brain. In this talk I will give an overview of technologies that recently emerged from our lab. First, recent optogenetic tools have begun to reach the physical limits of performance. The optogenetic molecules (opsins) Chronos and Chrimson enable activation of distinct neural populations with multiple colors of light, and Jaws is a red shifted inhibitor of neural activity that enables noninvasive neural silencing. Since opsins express all along cell membranes, light focused on one cell body will result in artifactual activation of multiple cells, whose processes are physically touching the neuron of interest. To tackle this problem, we designed a class of somatic opsins that express mainly at the cell body. This, in combination with holographic stimulation enables single cell optogenetics at millisecond temporal resolution.
Activity sensors represent an area of great interest in neuroengineering. The voltage sensor Archon is an archaerhodopsin-based molecule with a high voltage sensitivity and brightness compared to its predecessors. The aforementioned cross talk problem also pertains to sensors: since cell-processes are touching cell bodies, the signal coming from a cell body could in principle originate from nearby cells. To solve this problem we developed a GCaMP6f molecule that is retained in the cell body only, called somaGCaMP6f. This molecule enables low crosstalk physiological imaging in mice and fish.
Lastly, we have developed a technology that greatly facilitates the mapping of the brain. Optical super-resolution techniques are slow and costly, and accordingly do not scale well to large-scale brain circuitry. Instead of improving the resolving power of the microscope, we have found a way to physically expand biological specimens 4x-20x in linear dimension, in an isotropic fashion. This method, which we call expansion microscopy (ExM), enables the mapping of molecules of interest across cells and tissues of extended scale, and thus facilitates the analysis of neural circuits across scales of relevance to understanding brain function.
(Invited) Electrolytic Hydrogen Clearance for Measuring Cerebral Blood Flow
Authors: McCarty Gregory S , Lee Christie A , Walton Lindsay , Sombers Leslie A , Wightman Robert Mark 
Published: February 2020

Cerebral blood flow (CBF) controls the delivery of glucose and oxygen to the brain. Blood flow is increased to activated tissue in a phenomenon known as functional hyperemia. Currently, either optical techniques or fMRI is utilized to monitor CBF. This presentation will discuss efforts to use electrolytic hydrogen clearance (EHC) to monitor changes in blood flow in the brain. In EHC hydrogen is generated by an electrode and its clearance monitored by a separate electrode. The rate of clearance can be correlated with physical processes that alter its local concentration, such as diffusion and blood flow. In this work, a microfabricated sensor comprised of a pair of platinum electrodes is utilized for making EHC measurements. Microfabricating the sensor enables small probes to be fabricated, small enough to enable use deep in the brain. This sensor has been characterized ex vivo, demonstrating its operation. More recent efforts have transitioned the sensor in vivo to compare blood flow in the cortex during spreading depolarization and in the striatum during pharmacology.
(Invited) Chemistry of Robust Neural Interfaces
Authors: Takmakov Pavel A 
Published: February 2020

Neural implants of the future will be able to acquire and process signals from the nervous system to develop patient- and situation-specific electrical neuromodulation for therapeutic effects. This approach provides fantastic opportunities for dynamic, flexible and personalized treatments. However, realization of this vision requires robust neural interfaces between medical devices and biological tissue. Device failures because of the body’s immune response as well as adverse effects associated with neuromodulation are significant challenges. We are developing in vitro platforms to (1) establish root causes of these issues and (2) provide methods and techniques for rapid development of robust neural implant technologies.
One “side-effect” associated with neuromodulation is irreversible electrochemical reactions that can introduce harmful chemical species during charge injection. The exact nature of these reactions is not well understood. In this work, an in vitro platform for quantification of these reactions that is suitable for use with any specific stimulation protocol has been developed. It was observed that charge injection with imbalanced waveforms leads to decrease in dissolution of platinum. This finding suggests a reduction in irreversible electrochemical reactions, which is contrary to accepted belief.
The second aspect of a robust neural interface is related to current reliance of a new generation of neural implants on microfabrication technology, which does not necessarily yield devices with high tolerance for a biological environment. This calls for extensive R&D work on developing reliable devices. Testing of new implant designs in chronic animal experiments is slow and expensive. To facilitate innovation, reactive accelerated aging (RAA) platform has been developed. RAA is an in vitro system that simulates the biological environment, particularly attack of an implant by the immune system by exposing the device to elevated temperature and hydrogen peroxide for a short duration. RAA was used to discover failure modes for commercial devices that included dissolution of metal, delamination or substantial loss of insulation with further violation of its electrical and barrier properties. RAA was validated by comparing to failures modes that have been observed after chronic implantation in rodent brain.
(Invited) Plasma Membrane Cholesterol as a Diagnostic
Authors: Li Li , Lu Binyu , Shin Minchul , Kelley Thomas , Burgess James D. 
Published: February 2020

Cholesterol is a tightly regulated major structural component of the cell plasma membrane (PM) where it forms stoichiometric complexes with phospholipids and sphingolipids. The amount of cholesterol in the PM exhibits a regulatory role in basal activity of several biomolecular processes by direct binding to proteins and by indirect local environmental effects within the PM that are also coupled to overall cellular cholesterol homeostasis. The term “active cholesterol” refers to PM cholesterol not complexed to lipids, a cholesterol state that arises above a threshold mole fraction of cholesterol in the PM. Active cholesterol level in the PM provides a control mechanism for cellular cholesterol homeostasis through its recognition by membrane bound proteins that activate genes of cholesterol synthesis enzymes. Uptake of LDL, production and release of HDL as well as reversible storage of cholesterol in the cytosol by covalent modification are also regulated and dependent on PM cholesterol (thermodynamic) activity: active cholesterol. A number of human disease states have been found to have associated alterations in PM cholesterol. Thus, an experimental aim of this research group has been the ability to monitor PM cholesterol thermodynamic activity at live cells and tissues without significant perturbation of the native physiological state. In particular, the active cholesterol pool is easily depleted leading to its physiological determination by traditional assays being out of reach. Our approach is to measure the rate of cholesterol diffusion from the PM at the point-of-contact of a microelectrode. The enzyme-modified electrode consumes the sparingly-soluble aqueous-cholesterol adjacent to the PM thus perturbing the equilibrium between aqueous- and PM-cholesterol resulting in diffusion of cholesterol from the PM only at the site of electrode contact. That is, the enzyme modified electrode creates a demand for cholesterol at the site of contact and measures the diffusional response. The rate of cholesterol diffusion (micro-extraction) is related to the thermodynamic activity of cholesterol (which is controlled by the active cholesterol concentration) in the PM by classic kinetic theory. The transition state is cholesterol that has exited the PM and has not yet formed a solvent cage. Through Collaboration with Minchul Shin at Georgia Southern University, ongoing work for human cholesterol sensing is using nano/micro manufacturing to produce sensor chips containing well-spaced regions of SiO2 that are circular with a 10-20 µm diameter for attachment of oxidase. This general approach to noninvasive human sensing could serve as a platform for screening children for hypercholesterolemia and for other markers such as glucose.
Characterization of Sintered Lithium-Ion Battery Electrodes
Authors: Robinson Pierce , Koenig Gary 
Published: February 2020

Conventional lithium-ion batteries often have a low volume fraction of active material and a low electrode thickness in order to achieve high cycling rates and mechanical properties needed for electrode processing and cell assembly, but this limits the energy density that can be achieved at the cell level. Close-packed sintered electrodes are an alternative architecture that can achieve a high fraction of active material, but require careful design and understanding of the microstructure of the film. Sintered electrodes were fabricated using hydraulic pressing of active material powders into pellets, followed by sintering and assembly into cells. The performance of these electrodes has been tested through electrochemical cycling with promising initial results. The conductivities of the electrodes were examined and related to the battery polarization in coin cells. This study examines the relationship between electrode microstructure and electrochemical properties in sintered electrodes, while varying key parameters such as tortuosity, sintering conditions, thickness, active material chemistry, and particle size.
NiCo2O4
@Ni As the New Air Electrode Material to Enhance the Performance in Rechargeable Zinc–Air Batteries Application
Authors: Qiao Jinli , Nie Qi 
Published: February 2020

In recent years, pollution and shortage of fossil fuels in the environment have made it a popular trend to develop portable electronic devices, use renewable energy and grid-scale energy storage in electric vehicles. Batteries have long been recognized for their capacity to convert and store electrical energy efficiently. In the present work, rechargeable metal−air batteries such as Zn-air batteries could be idealized energy storage devices which have attracted much attention compared with lithium-ion batteries ,because Zn-air batteries possess high power density, economic viability and high safety.[1-2]
Active and durable electrocatalysts on the cathode side are required to catalyse oxygen reduction reaction during discharge and oxygen evolution reaction during charge for rechargeable batteries.[3]

The aim of experiment is to synthesize mesoporous NiCo2O4@Ni. All the reagents used in this experiment were analytical grade and were used without further purification. In a typical synthetic procedure, a piece of nickel foam was thoroughly cleaned with 3 M HCl solution in an ultrasound bath for 30 minutes in order to remove the NiO layer on the surface and then washed by deionized water and absolute ethanol. Put it into watch glasses for drying. C4H6NiO4 • 4H2O (0.3 g), Co(NO3)2 • 6H2O (0.6 g) and hexamethylenetetramine (HMT, 0.8 g) were dissolved into a mixed solution of deionized water (30 mL) and ethanol (20 mL) under vigorous magnetic stirring. After stirring for 30 min, the as-obtained solution was transferred into a 60 mL polytetra-fluoroethylene (PTFE) (Teflon)-lined autoclave, and then use the cleaned nickel foam which has been worked to immerse into the reaction solution. The autoclave was sealed and maintained at 95 °C for 8 hours in an electric oven. After cooling to room temperature, the products on the nickel foam were washed with deionized water and absolute ethanol for several times respectively and then dried the nickel foam at 60°C overnight. Afterward, the samples were annealed at 250° C, 350° C and 450° C for 1h at a ramping rate of 1°C min-1 to transform into NiCo2O4@Ni-250, NiCo2O4@Ni-350 and NiCo2O4@Ni-450.
NiCo2O4@Ni-350 is a new air electrode material which has been synthesized via a hydrothermal method. This nanomaterial displays good bifunctional ORR/OER activity, cyclic stability, low cost and high energy density in the discharge and charge process. Further studies are ongoing to improve the Zn-Air batteries performance by manipulating the structure.
References
[1] D.U. Lee, J.Y. Choi, K. Feng, H.W. Park, Z.W. Chen, Advanced Energy Materials, 4,1301389(2014).
[2] P.C. Pei, Z. Ma, K.L. Wang, X.Z. Wang, M.C.Song, H.C.Xu, Journal Of Power Sources, 249,3(2014)
[3] V. Neburchilov, H.J. Wang, J.J. Martin, W. Qu, J. Power Sources 195,1271 (2010).