Jie Li
Principal Chemical Engineer Jie Li (NE) will discuss his Laboratory-Directed Research and Development (LDRD) sponsored work at the LDRD Seminar Series presentation Tuesday, Dec. 13, 2016.
“From Autoclave to Continuous Flow Process: Optimizing Chemical Kinetics and Processes for Large-scale Production of Thermochromic VO2 Nanomaterial” will begin at 12:30 p.m. in Bldg. 203, Auditorium. All are welcome to attend.
Abstract
Nanoparticles have many applications due to their outstanding characteristics. However, large-scale manufacturing of high-quality nanoparticles with controlled properties is non-trivial; technical challenges exist especially for materials that are difficult to synthesize. Recently it has been discovered that VO2 nano-particulate film can double solar infrared heat modulation and transmittance efficiency of visible light when compared to those of its bulk film counterpart, making it a promising next-generation thermochromic material for designing high-performance smart windows. However, current manufacturing method using an autoclave reactor prevents massive production due to low conversion efficiency, poor control of product quality and safety, and extremely slow process (days). Modern green chemistry/process provide fundamentals to enhance such manufacturing through use of: (1) high temperature to exponentially accelerate chemical reaction, and thus drastically shorten the synthesis time; (2) more powerful energy supply approaches (e.g., microwave, micro-reactor) to intensify transfer process and thus boost reaction conversion and product selectivity; and (3) simple and scalable manufacturing to enable quickly and economically market acceptable products (e.g. via continuous-flow synthesis in a small module chemical reactor). With LDRD support, we seek to develop a highly efficient process to massively manufacture VO2 nanoparticles (rods).
This presentation will introduce the “smart windows” concept, followed by our development of a continuous flow hydrothermal synthesis system using a microscale reactor. The experimental demonstration will show, for the first time, that it is feasible to continuously synthesize VO2 (M) micro- and nanoparticles in a single step within a significantly reduced synthesis time by using our novel processing technology. I will explain the influence that in situ surface modification of the nucleated particles using surfactants has had on particle carry-out with the effluent. In addition, our ongoing activities related to the material scale-up and commercialization will also be briefly discussed. Finally, I will give my perspective on applying our process to preparation of other advanced nanomaterials. Through this work, we seek to develop the knowledge, network and nano-material processing technique to support advanced manufacturing of, not only smart building materials, but a spectrum of other advanced micro- and nanoscale-powder materials as well in the long run, which are becoming increasingly necessary, and also important, as raw materials in additive manufacturing (3D printing) of metallic and metal oxide devices.
Biography
Jie Li is a principal chemical engineer. He received his B.S. and M.S. from Northwest University, in Xi’an, and a Ph.D. from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, in Beijing. During his 14 years at Argonne, Jie has worked on nonlinear control of flow instability in G-S two-phase flows, development of advanced materials including cathode materials via atomic layer deposition coatings and thermal insulating nano-foam for high-performance windows. Also, he is a leading thermal analyst and technical reviewer for the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management program. Prior to his work at Argonne, Jie’s research focused on theoretical studies on the flow instability of particulate multiphase flows in gas-fluidized bed reactors by developing and using DEM/CFD code, in the Netherlands, and development of powder processing technologies in China.