Stekene, Flemish Region, Belgium
From September 26th to Januari 30st I was part of the Extreme Energy-Density research group lead by prof. Tadachika Nakayama at Nagaoka University of Technology.
During the final year of my Applied Chemical Engineering education I had the pleasure of completing my Master's thesis at ELCAT, a research group at University of Antwerp covering electrochemistry. Recent advances in carbon capture and utilization (CCU) have facilitated investigation of techniques that limit CO2 emission, while also enabling CO2 removal from the atmosphere. Selective electrochemical reduction is one of the most attractive CCU techniques due to its potential to convert the harmful greenhouse gases into valuable chemicals. The goal of my Master's thesis was to synthesize and test interesting electrocatalysts for CO2 reduction in a flow cell to three groups of products: 1) CO, 2) ethanol and ethylene, and 3) methanol. CO2 reduction to CO was achieved using silver nanoparticles on a nitrogen-doped ordered mesoporous carbon (NOMC) structure. A copper selenide electrocatalyst was synthesized based on literature and tested in an aqueous environment to reduce CO2 to ethanol and ethylene. For the last product, methanol, a hollow urchin-like cobalt catalyst was synthesized and investigated on its activity and selectivity. Every electrocatalyst was characterized using ICP-MS, SEM, and XRD.
Working in a grocery store as a student made me learn a lot about organization, having a neat working space and most importantly: communication. In stores like this you are in direct contact and dialogue with costumers and fellow workers for almost the whole day. Therefore, it is very important to me to be friendly, polite while also being professional.
During this internship I worked with the Membrane Technology Laboratory while also writing my thesis. The study I took part in was the recycling of a deep eutectic solvent using membrane technology. To research this subject I often used the FT-IR meter,a Rheometer and a membrane filtration module (Amicon).