Reduction of Nitrogen-Oxygen Containing Contaminants (NOCs) in Aquatic Environments

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

With this award, the Environmental Chemical Sciences Program of the Division of Chemistry is funding Professor Huichun J. Zhang of Temple University to examine the nitrogen-oxygen single bond (N-O) as a reducible functional group toward reductive transformations under environmental conditions. The introduction of N-O containing contaminants (NOCs) into aquatic environments is an important emerging water issue. This project aims to develop accurate environmental risk assessment of NOCs and to develop advanced technologies to effectively treat NOCs contaminated water and sites. The findings are expected to help guide the chemical industry to design more environmentally-friendly chemical products. The project is expected to broaden participation from underrepresented minorities and women in environmental chemistry/engineering and to provide training for future scientists and engineers in this cross-disciplinary area.This project focuses on examining reduction kinetics and mechanisms of a diverse range of NOCs by soluble Fe(II) species through a combination of experimental and theoretical approaches. Advanced experimental approaches, including kinetic, electrochemical cell, isotopic, spectroscopic and chromatographic approaches, are to be conducted to elucidate key elementary steps in NOC reductions, such as protonation, complexation, electron transfer and N-O bond cleavage. The most likely rate-limiting step of each subset of NOCs is to be identified by characterizing all of the stationary points in the relevant elementary steps along the reaction pathway. Molecular descriptors are being computed to develop quantitative structure-activity relationships so as to provide the community with quantifiable and experimentally grounded numbers that pertain to the susceptibility of N-O bonds to reductive cleavage in the environment.