Jillian Goldfarb

Biorenewable Nanomaterials: Using Biomass as a Fuel Source and Nano-template

PROJECT DESCRIPTION
As we evolve towards a greener future, we seek renewable fuels and sustainable manufacturing methods to reduce our global environmental impact. This project marries two seemingly disparate fields – the production of renewable fuels from biomass and the fabrication of novel metal oxide nanoparticles – in a simultaneous process. Using solution chemistry to impregnate biomass with inorganic compounds, followed by heat treatment, we recover syngas, bio-oil, and bio-templated nanoparticles with unique structures and properties. The inorganic compounds act as a catalyst to improve the fuels evolved from biomass by increasing the stability of the bio-oil and promoting higher energy density syngas production. The biomass serves as a removable template for nanoparticle growth, creating structures with higher surface areas and properties mimicking nature. This co-! production of energy and materials opens new possibilities in the bio-refinery concept, not only to capture energy from renewables such as biomass, but also to produce high value nanomaterials for a range of applications in a more sustainable way. The participants will receive daily mentoring directly from the PI; as the PI has recently hired and is hiring several PhD students and postdoctoral researchers, she will be spending several hours each day in the laboratory, directly supervising her students and program participants.

LEARNING GOALS
• Acquire skills in a variety of laboratory processes and characterization techniques. These include: thermochemical conversion, gas chromatography-mass spectrometry, precision weighing, thermogravimetric analysis, differential scanning calorimetry, physical adsorption, evolved gas analysis; x-ray diffractometry and scanning electron microscopy.
• Recognize how to combine ideas from a variety of disciplines (materials science, chemical engineering, and green chemistry) to forge a new research pathway.
• Take ownership of their project, from surveying the literature on the fabrication of bio-templated nanomaterials and how bio-fuels can be altered by the presence of a specific inorganic compound, to working with a biomass to produce fuels and nanoparticles, to characterizing both the fuels and materials produced.
• Participants will be mentored through the process of writing a peer-reviewed journal article with the goal of submitting a manuscript by the end of the program.
• Cultivate an understanding of how to design and implement a research project and how to work independently and with collaborators in a research setting.

Learn more about Professor Schmidt’s work.