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Research Experience and Training Coordination Core (RETCC)

2022 Oct 20

RETCC Career Hour

12:00pm

Location: 

Via Zoom (MEMCARE-SRC members only)
Join RETCC Director Susan Korrick in a conversation with Zhanlei Ye, PhD, and Bryan Stierman 

 

as they talk about their inspiring career trajectories. Read more about RETCC Career Hour
Holly Rudel

Trainee brings environmental engineering skills to Apple

July 6, 2022

Holly Rudel, a Project 4 trainee and doctoral student in Enviornmental Engineering  at the Yale School of Engineering and Applied Science is spending her summer working as the Environmental Technologies intern for Apple in Cupertino, CA. Looking forward to hearing details about her intership this fall...!

2022 Oct 20

RETCC Career Hour

12:00pm

Location: 

Via Zoom (MEMCARE-SRC members only)
2022 Nov 17

Trainee Work in Progress meeting

Repeats on the third Thursday of January, February, March, April, May, June until Thu Jun 15 2023 except Thu Mar 16 2023. Also includes Thu Mar 23 2023.
12:00pm

Location: 

Via Zoom (MEMCARE-SRC members only)
Srishti Gupta, Ngan Anh Nguyen, and Christopher L. Muhich. 7/2022. “Surface water H-bonding network is key controller of selenate adsorption on [012] α-alumina: An Ab-initio study.” Journal of Colloid and Interface Science, 617, Pp. 136-146. Publisher's VersionAbstract
Selenate adsorption onto metal oxide surfaces is a cost-effective method to remove the toxin from drinking water systems. However, the low selectivity of metal oxides requires frequent sorbent replacement. The design of selective adsorbents is stymied because the surface factors controlling selenate adsorption remain unknown. We calculate adsorption energies of selenate on the (0 1 2) α-Al2O3 surface using density functional theory to unravel the physics that controls adsorption. Our model is validated against experiment by correctly predicting selenate removal efficiency as a function pH. We find that the selenate adsorption energy on the anhydrous α-Al2O3 surface is surprisingly anti-correlated with the fully solvated adsorption energy; therefore, the direct interaction between adsorbate and sorbent is eliminated as the controlling mechanism. Rather, the change in number of surface hydrogen bonds after adsorption is the factor most correlated with the adsorption energy (R2 > 0.8); and is thus determined to be the factor controlling selenate adsorption. We find that pH affects adsorption by controlling the number of surface protons available for H-bonding to selenate. This work demonstrates that adsorption prediction should not be made based on gas phase sorption energies and suggests that surface engineering which increases surface protonation may be an effective strategy for increasing selenate sorption.

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