Fractal Reactor in Micro-Scale for Process Intensification

Author(s):  
Yue Lu ◽  
Gang Wang ◽  
Zhuangdian Liang ◽  
Jian Sun ◽  
Yu Gu ◽  
...  

AbstractFractal theory, with its novel architectures inspired by nature, provides some novel concepts for smart reactor design. Here, researches on the applications of fractal theory to micro-reactor design are reviewed, in term of its high surface area-to-volume ratio, rapid and direct numbering-up, safety, and precise control. In addition, two designs of fractal micro-reactor are introduced as typical examples. First, the H-type fractal structure is considered in the context of the design of a double-plate micro-reactor, which is used for photocatalytic reactions of CO2. Second, applications of fractal Hilbert curves are considered in the design of channel structures for gas-liquid reactions. These two fractal micro-reactors can be fabricated via 3D printing technology and used for CO2conversion under mild conditions.

2021 ◽  
Vol 22 (12) ◽  
pp. 6357
Author(s):  
Kinga Halicka ◽  
Joanna Cabaj

Sensors and biosensors have found applications in many areas, e.g., in medicine and clinical diagnostics, or in environmental monitoring. To expand this field, nanotechnology has been employed in the construction of sensing platforms. Because of their properties, such as high surface area to volume ratio, nanofibers (NFs) have been studied and used to develop sensors with higher loading capacity, better sensitivity, and faster response time. They also allow to miniaturize designed platforms. One of the most commonly used techniques of the fabrication of NFs is electrospinning. Electrospun NFs can be used in different types of sensors and biosensors. This review presents recent studies concerning electrospun nanofiber-based electrochemical and optical sensing platforms for the detection of various medically and environmentally relevant compounds, including glucose, drugs, microorganisms, and toxic metal ions.


Geofluids ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 2019 ◽  
pp. 1-26 ◽  
Author(s):  
Helge Skarphagen ◽  
David Banks ◽  
Bjørn S. Frengstad ◽  
Harald Gether

Borehole thermal energy storage (BTES) exploits the high volumetric heat capacity of rock-forming minerals and pore water to store large quantities of heat (or cold) on a seasonal basis in the geological environment. The BTES is a volume of rock or sediment accessed via an array of borehole heat exchangers (BHE). Even well-designed BTES arrays will lose a significant quantity of heat to the adjacent and subjacent rocks/sediments and to the surface; both theoretical calculations and empirical observations suggest that seasonal thermal recovery factors in excess of 50% are difficult to obtain. Storage efficiency may be dramatically reduced in cases where (i) natural groundwater advection through the BTES removes stored heat, (ii) extensive free convection cells (thermosiphons) are allowed to form, and (iii) poor BTES design results in a high surface area/volume ratio of the array shape, allowing high conductive heat losses. The most efficient array shape will typically be a cylinder with similar dimensions of diameter and depth, preferably with an insulated top surface. Despite the potential for moderate thermal recovery, the sheer volume of thermal storage that the natural geological environment offers can still make BTES a very attractive strategy for seasonal thermal energy storage within a “smart” district heat network, especially when coupled with more efficient surficial engineered dynamic thermal energy stores (DTES).


2008 ◽  
Vol 72 (1) ◽  
pp. 85-89 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. R. Leake ◽  
A. L. Duran ◽  
K. E. Hardy ◽  
I. Johnson ◽  
D. J. Beerling ◽  
...  

AbstractBiological weathering is a function of biotic energy expenditure. Growth and metabolism of organisms generates acids and chelators, selectively absorbs nutrient ions, and applies turgor pressure and other physical forces which, in concert, chemically and physically alter minerals. In unsaturated soil environments, plant roots normally form symbiotic mycorrhizal associations with fungi. The plants provide photosynthate-carbohydrate-energy to the fungi in return for nutrients absorbed from the soil and released from minerals. In ectomycorrhiza, one of the two major types of mycorrhiza of trees, roots are sheathed in fungus, and 15—30% of the net photosynthate of the plants passes through these fungi into the soil and virtually all of the water and nutrients taken up by the plants are supplied through the fungi. Here we show that ectomycorrhizal fungi actively forage for minerals and act as biosensors that discriminate between different grain sizes (53—90 μm, 500—1000 μm) and different minerals (apatite, biotite, quartz) to favour grains with a high surface-area to volume ratio and minerals with the highest P content. Growth and carbon allocation of the fungi is preferentially directed to intensively interact with these selected minerals to maximize resource foraging.


Author(s):  
Edit Hirsch ◽  
Márió Nacsa ◽  
Ferenc Ender ◽  
Miklós Mohai ◽  
Zsombor K. Nagy ◽  
...  

Nanoscale fibers were prepared for the fabrication of scaffolds by using a strong electrostatic field on the polymer solution. Electrospinning is widely applied for production of drug delivery, tissue engineering, and regenerative medicine systems as well as biosensors and enzyme immobilization. Nanofibers, thanks to their high surface area to volume ratio, can also mimic the extracellular matrix, thus it has been recognized as a suitable technique for the fast fabrication of scaffolds. This article demonstrates the fabrication of several nanofibrous scaffolds from biopolymers such as polycaprolactone, poly(lactic acid), poly(lactide-co-glycolide), poly(lactide-co-caprolactone) and poly(hydroxybutyrate-co-hydroxy valerate). The characterization and comparison of the scaffolds were achieved based on the morphology and surface characteristic of the nanofibers. The samples showed hydrophobic characteristic, thus a plasma surface treatment was applied successfully to increase hydrophilicity and the effect of the treatment was evaluated based on the wettability and the change in elemental composition of the surface based on X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy.


Author(s):  
Andrew D. Dias ◽  
David M. Kingsley ◽  
Douglas B. Chrisey ◽  
David T. Corr

Microbeads are becoming popular tools in tissue engineering as 3D microstructure hydrogels. The gel nature of microbeads enables them to sequester soluble factors and mammalian cells, and their high surface area-to-volume ratio allows diffusion between the bead and the environment [1,2]. Microbeads are thus good systems for drug delivery and can serve as 3D microenvironments for cells. To fully maximize their potential as delivery systems and microenvironments, it is highly desirable to create spatially-precise hybrid cultures of microbeads and mammalian cells. Precise placement of microbeads in proximity to patterned cells will allow the study of spatial cellular interactions, paracrine signaling, and drug delivery.


Molecules ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 23 (7) ◽  
pp. 1760 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fernanda Guerra ◽  
Mohamed Attia ◽  
Daniel Whitehead ◽  
Frank Alexis

Environmental remediation relies mainly on using various technologies (e.g., adsorption, absorption, chemical reactions, photocatalysis, and filtration) for the removal of contaminants from different environmental media (e.g., soil, water, and air). The enhanced properties and effectiveness of nanotechnology-based materials makes them particularly suitable for such processes given that they have a high surface area-to-volume ratio, which often results in higher reactivity. This review provides an overview of three main categories of nanomaterials (inorganic, carbon-based, and polymeric-based materials) used for environmental remediation. The use of these nanomaterials for the remediation of different environmental contaminants—such as heavy metals, dyes, chlorinated organic compounds, organophosphorus compounds, volatile organic compounds, and halogenated herbicides—is reviewed. Various recent examples are extensively highlighted focusing on the materials and their applications.


2019 ◽  
Vol 9 ◽  
pp. 184798041882447 ◽  
Author(s):  
Johnson Michael ◽  
Zhang Qifeng ◽  
Wang Danling

MXenes have been under a lot of scientific investigation due to the novel characteristics that are inherent to two-dimensional nanostructures. There are a multitude of MXenes being studied and one of the most popular among these would be the titanium carbides. The general formula for titanium carbide is Ti n+ 1C n for the nanosheets produced that have undergone much study in the past few years. These studies include how the etching process affects the final MXene sheet and how the post-processing via heat or combining with polymers and/or inorganic compounds influences the mechanical and electrical properties. It is found that different etching techniques can be used to change the electrical properties of the produced MXenes and different post-processing techniques can be used to further change the properties of the nanosheets. The possible application of the titanium carbide MXenes as chemical sensing and energy storage materials will be briefly discussed. MXene nanosheets show promise in such devices due to their high surface area to volume ratio and their specific surface structure with feasible surface functionalization.


1977 ◽  
Author(s):  
C.G. Cockburn ◽  
Diana M.L. Reay ◽  
R.M. Hardisty

A simple method has been developed for cutting washed FVIII:anti-FVIII immunoprecipitates from agarose gels and applying the SDS-denatured, reduced protein to SDS-polyacrylamide gels. The relative amounts of IgG heavy and light chains and FVIII have been quantitated by recording the areas under the densitometer traces of the Coomassie brilliant blue-stained gels. The results show that approximately 20 molecules of anti-FVIII bind per 200,000 daltons of native FVIII. We conclude from this that the factor VIII subunits hava a high surface-area-to-volume ratio.


Chemosensors ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 99
Author(s):  
Sarah N. Mobarez ◽  
Nongnoot Wongkaew ◽  
Marcel Simsek ◽  
Antje J. Baeumner ◽  
Axel Duerkop

Electrospun nanofibers (ENFs) are remarkable analytical tools for quantitative analysis since they are inexpensive, easily produced in uniform homogenous mats, and provide a high surface area-to-volume ratio. Taking advantage of these characteristics, a near-infrared (NIR)-dye was doped as chemosensor into ENFs of about 500 nm in diameter electrospun into 50 µm thick mats on indium tin oxide (ITO) supports. The mats were made of cellulose acetate (CA) and used as a sensor layer on optical dipsticks for the determination of biogenic amines (BAs) in food. The ENFs contained the chromogenic amine-reactive chameleon dye S0378 which is green and turns blue upon formation of a dye-BA conjugate. This SN1-reaction of the S0378 dye with various BAs was monitored by reflectance measurements at 635 nm where the intrinsic absorption of biological material is low. The difference of the reflectance before and after the reaction is proportional to BA levels from 0.04–1 mM. The LODs are in the range from 0.03–0.09 mM, concentrations that can induce food poisoning but are not recognized by the human nose. The calibration plots of histamine, putrescine, spermidine, and tyramine are very similar and suggesting the use of the dipsticks to monitor the total sample BA content. Furthermore, the dipsticks are selective to primary amines (both mono- and diamines) and show low interference towards most nucleophiles. A minute interference of proteins in real samples can be overcome by appropriate sample pretreatment. Hence, the ageing of seafood samples could be monitored via their total BA content which rose up to 21.7 ± 3.2 µmol/g over six days of storage. This demonstrates that optically doped NFs represent viable sensor and transducer materials for food analysis with dipsticks.


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