(VELOCYS) Devices with Extended Area Structures for Mass Transfer Processing of Fluids (Incorp. 14328-E PROV 1, 2, 3 and IR 14180-E)
This invention represents a new class of microreactors. Microchannel reactors have been proven very effective in providing rapid heat transfer to support highly exothermic and endothermic reactions, such as steam reforming. Typically, these reactors use an interleaved architecture where they are for heat transfer between the reaction channels and heat exchange channels is comparable to the area for mass transfer from the reaction flow channel to the adjacent catalyst structure. This invention is useful for classes of reactions that are either mildly exothermic or endothermic, utilize a catalyst with low or moderate activity, or require carefully controlled heat transfer, such as when establishing a temperature profiles down the length of the reactor. In these cases, the normal interleaved approach can lead to an excessive area for heat transfer relative to the are for mass transfer, resulting in an oversized reactor, an unnecessary small temperature driving force, and/or quenching of the ration. This invention allows for much higher mass transfer area relative to heat transfer area to overcome these limitations. A prototype water-gas-shift reactor has been designed utilizing this concept, including detailed heat transfer calculations. A finite element simulation of this reactor is anticipated in the next several weeks. A prototype reactor will be built and tested over the next several months. The reactor will include a section that will be operated with a temperature profile down the length between 410 degrees C and 275 degrees C to implement the differential temperature concept. Implementing this invention for the WGS reactor of a steam reforming fuel processor for automotive fuel cell power system dramatically reduces the size and weight of this component enabling the system to approach power density and specific power targets for the Freedom Car. In addition, this invention provides improved catalyst productivity, reducing the catalyst cost
CONTROLLED SYNTHESIS OF HIERARCHICALLY-STRUCTURED HYBRID MATERIALS THROUGH PEPTOID ENGINEERING
In nature, specific biomolecules interacting with mineral precurors are responsible for the precise production of nanostructured inorganic materials that exhibit complex morphologies and superior performance. Despite advances in developing biomimetic approaches, the design rules for creating sequence-defined molecules that lead to the synthesis of inorganic nanomaterials with predictable complex morphologies are unknown. To address this challenge, this patent application highlights a new peptoid-based biomimetic approach for controlled synthesis of hierarchically-structured metallic nanomaterials. Though the detailed investigation of some peptoid-controlled gold nanomaterial formation processes by engineering peptoid sequences and investigating the resulting particle formation mechanisms, we develop a rule of thumb for designing peptoids that predictively enabled the morphological evolution from spherical to coral-shaped nanoparticles. These individual coral-shaped gold nanoparticles exhibit a plasmonic enhancement as high as 105 fold. This research presented in this patent application significantly advances our ultimate vision of predictive bio-inspired materials synthesis using sequence-defined synthetic molecules that mimic proteins and peptides.
SOLID, HYDROPHOBIC AGGREGATORS AND METHODS OF MAKING AND USING THE SAME
This invention involves the design, synthesis, and application of a novel product to be used in the treatment of oil spills in aquatic environments. The product entails chemical modification of sawdust or wood flour (a cheap product of sawmills) to render it with hydrophobic, oleophilic, and buoyant properties. The resulting product is herein referred to as an aggregator. Aggregators modified with oleic acid (OA) were further modified with fatty acids (C3-C18) to cover surface hydroxyl groups on sawdust. The final products showed super hydrophobic and 44.2% enhancement of crude oil sorption relative to OA-modified aggregators. They also showed excellent stability and recyclability. The Invention Synthesis and property: Our earlier work included sawdust modification with OA (called 1st generation aggregator). The 1st generation aggregator entailed an oleic acid (OA: C18) modified 20-40 mesh pine flour. They showed 100-165% weight percent gain (WPG), excellent buoyance, and 4.17g crude oil sorption/g aggregator. Though they showed excellent properties and test results, XRD and TGA analysis suggested that improvements can be made to the aggregator to boost performance. We added second fatty acids with different alkyl chain lengths to the 1st generation aggregators, which have uncovered surface hydroxyl groups. We first prepared three base 1st generation aggregators: pine/OA-106, pine/OA-124, and pine/OA-160, where numbers indicate WPG of OA in pine sawdust. To the base aggregators, we added fatty acids with different alkyl chain lengths (C3, C6, C8, C10, C12, C14, C16, C18). We have several significant observations listed below: Pyridine is the most costly reagent in the synthesis ( > 45% of the materials costs). The used pyridine solvent contains HCl and p-Tosylate (p-Ts). In fact, a tiny amount of water does not affect the reaction. We tried to recycle (vacuum distillation after treated with KOH and magnesium sulfate) pyridine and about 60% pyridine was recycled. When different fatty acids were added to the base aggregators, fatty acids with C10-C14 showed highest WPG and all mixed fatty acid-modified aggregators showed very hydrodrophobic (much more hydrophobic than the base aggregators). XRD analysis showed that (002) peak of cellulose on aggregators modified with C10-C14 fatty acids was expanded from 4.23 to 4.60Å (original pine sawdust: 3.98Å) due to more fatty acids penetrated and modified. In the FT-IR spectra of aggregators modified with C10-C14 it was hard to observe OH stretching vibration at 3500cm-1, which indicates that all aggregators are superhydrophobic. The aggregators start decomposition at 230oC though the original pine does 328oC, and they leave less than 0.1wt% ash after burned off at 700oC. Crude oil sorption test: we tested our aggregators for crude oil sorption. Three base materials showed about about 4.5g crude oil/ g aggregator, and our new aggregators sorbed 5.0 -6.4g crude oil/ g aggregator. Specifically, pine/OA-106-C14 sample (second C14 fatty acid was chemically modified on pine/OA-106 aggregator) showed 6.4g crude oil/g, which is about 44.2% enhancement relative to that of the pine/OA-106. Crude oil sorbed pine/OA-106-C14 sample was recycled (washed with CH2Cl2). It is easily washed and showed same property.
Thermoelectric Devices and Applications for the Same
This invention describes a process for sputter deposition of thin films of alloys of Bi2Te3, Sb2Te3 and Bi2Se3 for thermoelectric energy conversion. The approach allows deposition of these films on glass and flexible substrates such as Kapton. The process was used to deposit n-type and p-type films that exhibit properties nearly as good as measured for bulk materials. A single thermocouple was formed from n-type and p-type films that produced 3 millivolts under a temperature difference of 10 degrees centigrade. This result demonstrates that miniature high-voltage, microwatt power sources can be constructed from thin film arrays deposited as described by the disclosed process.
METHODS AND SYSTEMS OF CHARACTERIZING AND COUNTING MICROBIOLOGICAL COLONIES
A means to rapidly count colonies of microorganisms on nutrient plates was developed. The practice may be used to speed many practices, procedures, and tests used in biology, microbiology, and medicine that rely in whole or in part on the ability to culture, enumerate, and assess microorganisms. The measurement tool, measurement process, and method of analysis will enable previously unattainable research into bacterial activity. The method is novel and valuable because it makes use of sensitive optical metrology to resolve growth of microorganisms much sooner than can be done with traditional methods. In short, white-light interferometry (WLI) is used to obtain high resolution 3-D profiles of microorganisms that have been placed on nutrient enriched agar plates. The resulting profiles have very fine sub-micron depth resolution and the ability to see single cells and microorganisms. Images may be captured at high magnification to observe a single microbe as it grows into a microcolony or images may be captured at low magnification to observe many microorganisms at once. Images are captured non-destructively which enables monitoring over time without apparent disruption microbial growth, activity, and processes. Traditional colony counting methods take 24 hrs for fast growing bacteria and up to 3 weeks for some species. This invention will allow researchers and clinicians to count colony forming units in a bacterial culture sample as early as 1-4 hrs after being applied to an agar plate. This invention would also require less material (smaller and fewer plates) and fewer resources (less incubation space and less time for incubation). A company that makes and sells WLI optical profilers would be able to modify their product hardware and software to accommodate this method. It could be sold as an add-on to their existing instrument. Traditionally, WLI instruments have been used to examine non-living hard surfaces (e.g., printed circuit boards, hard disks, machined parts, etc.). Licensing this technology would allow a maker of white-light interferometry instruments to expand into new markets, especially biomedical research and clinical testing. Users of this invention would benefit by performing colony counting much faster while using few resources and providing other relevant and significant morphological details that are not measurable by other means. This invention can be summarized as three major parts: A method to prepare, image, and analyze microbial cultures with WLI such that CFUs and other morphological traits can be rapidly assessed Culture plates with surface properties and optical characteristics that enhance and enable WLI imaging An integrated WLI imaging system for bacterial culture analysis that may include: modifications to existing WLI instruments or components such as sample holders or imaging stages, automated or semi-automated analysis routines implemented in software, and customized culture plates designed for WLI imaging. Full details of experiments done to demonstrate this invention are included in the appended manuscript.
POLYMER COMPOSITES FOR FUSED FILAMENT FABRICATION AND METHODS OF MAKING THE SAME
Material formulation for additive manufacturing (AM) will be central to the progression of the industry as it moves from novelty to a mainstream, disruptive technology. We disclose in the document methods and techniques of formulating highly porous specially engineered materials for use in fused deposition modeling printers, achieving high loadings of several species of Metal Organic Frameworks (MOFs) combined with a sacrificial fluoropolymer process that enables the retention of the parent MOF chemical characteristics. We have achieved loadings up to 50% with MOFs while still retaining the ability to print the material on a standard FDM machine. Through a sacrificial process, we show that surface areas up to 712 square meters per gram of printed material can be achieved. We have further demonstrated that high loadings are required to attain the functionality of the parent MOF characteristics, and have defined the lower threshold for viability of this loading.
FUNCTIONALLY GRADED COATINGS AND CLADDINGS (iEdison No. 0685901-13-0018)
A shear assisted extrusion process for producing cladded materials wherein a cladding material and a material to be cladded are placed in sequence with the cladded material positioned to contact a rotating scroll face first and the material to be cladded second. The two materials are fed through a shear assisted extrusion device at a preselected feed rate and impacted by a rotating scroll face to generate a cladded extrusion product. This process allows for increased through wall strength and decreases the brittleness in formed structures as compared to the prior art.
Methods and Apparatuses for Cross-Ontologial Analytics
This invention disclosure presents a method and system that exploits the impact that Endocrine Disrupting Chemicals (EDCs) exert on gene products through receptor binding to refine the predictive power of Quantitative Structure-Activity Relationships (QSAR) modeling in identifying EDCs and to discover biomarkers associated with identified EDCs. The approach focuses on two main tasks: . Develop a framework to assess the toxicity of chemicals in terms of their impact at the gene/protein level . Use the impact of chemicals at the gene/protein level to identify biomarkers.
SHAPE PROCESSES, FEEDSTOCK MATERIALS, CONDUCTIVE MATERIALS AND/OR ASSEMBLIES (iEdison No. 0685901-13-0018)
A process for forming extruded products using a device having a scroll face configured to apply a rotational shearing force and an axial extrusion force to the same preselected location on material wherein a combination of the rotational shearing force and the axial extrusion force upon the same location cause a portion of the material to plasticize, flow and recombine in desired configurations. This process provides for a significant number of advantages and industrial applications, including but not limited to extruding tubes used for vehicle components with 50 to 100 percent greater ductility and energy absorption over conventional extrusion technologies, while dramatically reducing manufacturing costs.