Start
Jan 04, 2018 - 17:00
End
Jan 04, 2018 - 18:00
Venue
Room 118 Chemical Engg Dept
Event Type
Speaker
Prof. Varoon Kumar Agrawal EPFL Switzerland
Title
Towards the next-generation membranes for energy-efficient molecular separation
Abstract: Improving the energy-efficiency of the molecular separation is key to reduce the carbon footprint of the chemical and the petrochemical industries. Membranes operating with high separation selectivities can cut down the cost of the thermally driven separation processes such as distillation by up to 10-fold.1 2 Moreover chemically and thermally stable high-throughput membranes are expected to open new avenues for the process intensification and a wide-scale decentralized operation. Inspired by this we have been driven to develop synthetic and engineering routes to design chemically and thermally stable membranes that outperform the state-of-the-art-membranes in separation selectivity as well as productivity (membrane permeance). With this perspective I will present our recent endeavors to develop the nanoporous two-dimensional membranes which are the ultimate membranes for the gas separation. I will discuss our recent advances in the top-down and the bottom-up synthetic approaches solvothermal crystallization the novel designs of high-throughput porous support and the key challenges that still need to be overcome to develop the next-generation membranes.3 4 5 6 References: 1. Materials for Separation Technologies. Energy and Emission Reduction Opportunities. US Department of Energy 2005. 2. Sholl David S; Lively R. P. Seven Chemical Separations to Change the World. Nature 2016 532 435. 3. Varoon (Agrawal) et al. Dispersible Exfoliated Zeolite Nanosheets and Their Application as a Selective Membrane. Science 2011 334 72–75. 4. Agrawal et al. Oriented MFI Membranes by Gel-Less Secondary Growth of Sub-100-nm MFI-Nanosheet Seed Layers. Adv. Mater. 2015 27 3243–3249. 5. Agrawal et al. Fabrication Pressure Testing and Nanopore Formation of Single-Layer Graphene Membranes. J. Phys. Chem. C. 2017 121 14312–14321. 6. He G.; Dakhchoune M.; Zhao J.; Huang S.; Agrawal K. V. Electrophoretic Nuclei Assembly for Crystallization of High Performance Membranes on Unmodified Supports. Submitted.Bio: Prof. Agrawal is a tenure-track Assistant Professor at the Institute of Chemical Sciences and Engineering (ISIC) at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL). He is heading the laboratory of advanced separations (LAS) where his research group is developing synthetic routes for the two-dimensional nanoporous membranes with a precise control of nanopore size and functionality. He received his undergraduate degree in Chemical Engineering from IIT Bombay in 2005. Following this he joined the global R&D division of Procter & Gamble in Kobe Japan where he worked on the product design (2005-2008). Kumar joined the University of Minnesota to pursue a PhD degree in chemical engineering (2008-2013). The thesis work on development of zeolite nanosheets led to several high-impact publications (2 in Science Advanced Materials 3 in Angewandte Chemie International Edition Nature Communication etc.) He joined Strano group at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) as a postdoctoral researcher (2014) where he studied the effect of nanoconfinement on the phase transition of fluids leading to a publication in Nature Nanotechnology and several others. Kumar is the recipient of several awards including IIT Bombay Institute Silver Medal (2005) Manudhane Best Undergraduate Student award (2005) University of Minnesota Doctoral Degree Fellowship (2012) Sigma Xi Award (2013) the AIChE Separations Division Graduate Student Research Award (2013) etc.