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Publications

by Keyword: Electric field

Arnau M, Sans J, Gallego E, Perales JF, Turon P, Alemán C, (2024). Polarized hydroxyapatite, a ceramic nanocatalyst to convert automotive carbon emissions into ethanol Journal Of Environmental Chemical Engineering 12, 112255

This paper is aimed to develop ultrananoporous polarized hydroxyapatite (HAp) catalyst and evaluate its performance in transforming CO2 into useable ethanol considering three different scenarios: 1) a batch reaction using a mixture of CO2 and CH4 as feeding gas; 2) a batch reaction using as reactant exhaust gases captured from the fumes of diesel vehicles; and 3) a continuous flow reaction using pure CO2 as feeding gas. Ultrananoporous HAp scaffolds were prepared using a four-step process: 1) as prepared HAp powder was mixed with 60% wt. of a commercial hydrogel at low-temperature; 2) the resulting paste was shaped at low temperature to reduce the adhesion between the metallic tools and the mixture, enhancing the homogeneity of the sample; 3) the shaped paste was calcined in air by applying 1000 ºC during 2 h to eliminate the hydrogel; and 4) an external DC electric field of 3 kV/cm was imposed at 1000 ºC during 1 h to the calcined scaffold. The resulting polarized scaffolds both ultrananoporosity and catalytic activation. Thus, the mass: volume ratio of the ultrananoporous catalyst was much lower than that of conventional HAp catalyst (718 vs 5093 g/L. Furthermore, the ethanol yield was much higher (up to a factor of ×21.4) for the ultrananoporous catalyst than for the compact one, allowing us to conclude that ultrananoporous polarized HAp catalyst is a promising technology for transforming CO2 into valuable chemical products from highly polluted gases, especially those coming from road, sea and air transport. © 2024 Elsevier Ltd

JTD Keywords: A: ceramics, Air pollution, Automotives, Batch reactions, Calcination, Carbon, Carbon dioxide, Co2 fixation, Electric fields, Environmental process, Ethanol, Exhaust gases, Feeding gas, Fumes, Hydrogels, Hydroxyapatite, Lows-temperatures, Nano-catalyst, Nanocatalysts, Polarized catalyst, Scaffolds, Temperature, ]+ catalyst


Oliva, A. M., Homs-Corbera, A., Torrents, E., Juarez, A., Samitier, J., (2014). Synergystic effect of temperature and electric field intensity in Escherichia coli inactivation Micro and Nanosystems , 6, (2), 79-86

Electric Fields are increasingly used to manipulate bacteria. However, there is no systematic and definitive study on how the different electric parameters change bacteria viability. Here we present a study on the effects of electric field intensity and temperature to bacterial cultures. Escherichia coli colonies have been exposed to different electric field intensities at 1MHz during 5 minutes by means of a microfluidic device specially designed for the experiment. From the analysis of the results it is possible to see that Escherichia coli survival rate diminishes when applying field intensities as low as 220V during 5 minutes. Death rates also increase when stronger fields are applied. However, viability of survived bacteria is maintained. Additionally, temperature shows a synergistic effect with voltage. When temperature was increased, results showed a stronger sensitivity of cells to the electric field. Moreover, the expression patterns of Outer Membrane Protein A and Ribosomal Proteins differ in control and treated samples, suggesting changes in bacterial metabolism and structure.

JTD Keywords: E. coli, Electric field, Temperature, Viability