Experimental facilities
Equipment and user fees
Tunable Resistive Pulse Sensing (TRPS) equipment The laboratory facility is extened by another set of equipment called qNano and qMicro from Izon Science. Izon's qNano/qMicro equipment can be used to measure: 1) particle diameter; 2) effective surface charge and zeta potential; 3) concentration of nanoparticles in the solution. The equipment is based on Tunable Resistive Pulse Sensing (TRPS) technology. Sample particles are driven through the nanopore by applying a combination of pressure and voltage, and each particle causes a resistive pulse or "blockade" signal that is detected and measured by the application software. Manas Mandal has successfully achieved level 1 and level 2 competency certification on Izon's TRPS system. The competency is on particle diameter and concentration measurement.
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Mercury intrusion porosimeter The recently purchased Quantachrome PoreMaster 33 uses the principle of mercury intrusion porosimetry to measure the porosity and pore size distribution of porous materials. In our laboratory, it is used extensively to measure the porosity of fuel cell gas diffusion layers, micro-porous layers and catalyst layers.
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Fuel cell testing station The recently purchased Scribner Fuel Cell Testing 850e Station and Princeton Applied Research VersaSTAT4 can be used to test hydrogen and methanol fuel cells. In our laboratory, it is used extensively to measure active area, hydrogen cross-over and fuel cell performance for the fuel cells fabricated in our laboratory.
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Enviromental chamber Our Cincinnati Sub-Zero (CSZ) environmental chamber can be used to control temparture and humidity from about 200C to -40C. In our laboratory, it is currently being used to measure air-breathing fuel cell performance under cold weather conditions.
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Gas permeability and diffusivity setup We have developed an experimental setup to measure gas permeability and diffusivity in porous samples. The setup was used to obtain permeability and Knudsen diffusivity values for fuel cell gas diffusion layers (see, for example, N. Carrigy , L. Pant, S. Mitra, M. Secanell, "Knudsen Diffusivity and Permeability of PEMFC Microporous Coated Gas Diffusion Layers for Different Polytetrafluoroethylene Loadings", Journal of the Electrochemical Society, J. Electrochem. Society, 160(2):F81-F89, DOI: doi: 10.1149/2.036302jes).
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