Flame synthesis of MgO nanoparticles in a FASP Reactor
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Flame synthesis of MgO nanoparticles in a FASP Reactor Gianluigi De Falco1, Alexander Morgan2, Mario Commodo3, Patrizia Minutolo3, Andrea D’Anna1 1
Dipartimento di Ingegneria Chimica, Università “Federico II”, Piazzale Tecchio 80, 80125, Napoli, ITALY. 2
Department of Chemical Engineering, Loughborough University, Leicestershire, LE11 3TU, UK. 3
Istituto di Ricerche sulla Combustione, CNR, Piazzale Tecchio 80, 80125, Napoli, ITALY.
ABSTRACT The purpose of this work is the development and control of a high temperature reactor for the production of engineered nanoparticles, taking advantage from our previous studies on combustion-generated fine carbonaceous particles. The reactor consists of a laminar premixed flame, homogenously doped with monodisperse droplets of metal precursors dissolved or dispersed in volatile solvents. The droplets are generated by a vibrating orifice aerosol generator, and injected directly into the burner. Fuel-lean and stoichiometric flames allow producing pure metal oxide particles of nanometric sizes. Particles are collected by thermophoresis inserting a cold substrate in the flame by means of a pneumatic actuator. Morphological and dimensional analysis are performed on the collected particles by Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM) and Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM). SEM and AFM allow inferring both qualitative and quantitative information on many physical properties including size, morphology, surface texture and roughness. Experimental results have been obtained from a premixed stoichiometric flame of ethylene and air, doped with 75 microns droplets of magnesium nitrate hexahydrate dissolved in ethanol. Roughly monodisperse magnesium oxide particles, having a desired size ranging from 50 nm down to 7 nm, have been produced by altering the precursor concentration in the solution and the residence time of the synthesis process. INTRODUCTION Nanosized materials are playing an increasing crucial role across a wide range of applications, and new advanced techniques for the production of engineered organic and inorganic nanoparticles and their characterization are now in great demand; possible fields of use of these brand new materials range from optoelectronics to medical science. Preparation of the nanoparticles is important for obtaining well-defined characteristics, which in turn affects their ability to be used in different applications. Magnesium Oxide (MgO) is one of the most useful and promising material in the field of nanosized particles; the large surface area to volume ratio and the presence of reactive sites on the surface make MgO nanoparticles suitable for uses in a number of organic heterogeneous catalyst [1]. Other possible fields of application are temperature and humidity sensors [2] and cryosurgery [3] due to low cost, electro-stability, non-toxic, and biodegradable properties of MgO nanoparticles.
There are many methods currently undergoing research concerning nanoparticles synthesis. Flame Assisted Spray Pyrolysis (FASP) [4] is a form of combustion aerosol synthesis b
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