Center for Advanced Materials for Water Purification

美国和世界正面临着含水层枯竭、地表水供应不足、各种来源的污染（包括农业径流、工业排放、酸雨和地下水污染物）等非常现实的危险。水媒病原体对供水的威胁也越来越大。随着人口的继续增长，这些危险预计会增加。目前正在实施许多净化水技术，但目前用于净化水的膜和吸附剂材料不足以解决所有污染问题，也不足以满足为保护健康而提出的日益严格的新标准。最先进的材料都有众所周知的缺点，这是由于目前对基础科学的理解不足。事实上，为了应对迫在眉睫的水危机，开发安全、经济的水净化技术所需的革命性新材料和系统，需要科学家和工程师们协调一致、密集努力多年。该中心的愿景是将多学科的研究人员、教育工作者和实践者组成一个有凝聚力的团队，以开发新的功能材料和系统为美国和世界人民净化水的总体目标。这个科技中心（STC）有几个显著的特点。首先，它提供了以下领域研究人员的协调参与：斯坦福大学和伊利诺伊大学厄巴纳-香槟分校（UIUC）的水质，UIUC的材料科学，加州大学伯克利分校，克拉克亚特兰大大学，斯坦福大学和UIUC的基础物理科学（化学和物理），以及斯坦福大学和UIUC的系统级专家。此外，该中心通过与UIUC废物管理研究中心、奥兰治县（CA）水区以及其他水质组织的联系，促进水处理领域的技术转让和从业者的反馈。STC的另一个显著特点是为其教育、研究和推广功能建立了一个合作实验室（collaboratory），以确保活动的整合。在这个多学科合作实验室中，化学家、材料科学家、物理学家、生物学家和工程师将与中心的图书馆和信息科学专家一起工作，传播信息和研究成果，展示如何合成、表征和理解旨在从水中分离化合物和/或转化它们的新材料系统。该STC的前提是基于膜过滤器、吸附剂和催化表面的先进、选择性和高效的水处理技术。合理开发所需材料需要牢固掌握水界面的基础科学。关键问题是观察和操纵在埃到纳米尺度上的水溶液和固体衬底之间的相互作用。STC的目标是：(i)促进对这些相互作用的基本理解；（ii）通过合成能够选择性分离和/或转化水中化合物的新材料，利用这些结果从根本上改进膜、过滤器、吸附剂和离子交换材料；（iii）将这些新材料纳入可行的水净化系统；（四）将人力和知识基础设施与研究任务相结合，有效实施科学技术。为了实现这些目标，STC由四个核心团队组成：(i)界面过程和分子表征，（ii）材料合成和开发，（iii）系统分析和集成，以及（iv）合作教育和推广。本中心支持以下教育和推广活动：(i) K-12教师和学生了解为什么清洁水很重要，以及基础研究和声音工程如何有助于使水更清洁；（ii）科学和工程领域代表性不足的群体，鼓励这些群体的成员从事与水净化、材料科学和工程相关的职业；（iii）公民团体、水务专业人士和地方政府帮助制定、讨论和实施与水质控制有关的政策；（四）让广大市民了解净水基础研究的必要性。所有组成小组都由基于网络的协作实验室提供支持，以支持知识传播、指导、学习、公共辩论和讨论。合作实验室使用的主要工具是UIUC图书馆与信息科学学院开发的基于探究的学习和研究环境，它允许合作伙伴与中心的所有参与者和组成小组之间进行双向研究和教育。STC积极寻求增加教育、研究和推广的多样性。多样性对于增加科学和技术领域代表性不足群体的数量至关重要。如果所开发的知识和技术被不同的教育工作者和研究人员在美国和世界范围内实施，STC将产生最大的影响。为了实现这一影响，拟议中的STC与传统黑人学院和大学（HBCUs）和其他少数族裔机构（MIs）组成的环境技术联盟（ETC）合作，以增加少数族裔的参与。此外，中国农业大学是一个积极的水处理研究合作伙伴，它支持在水净化研究方面培训不同群体的学生。由于对改进水净化材料和工艺的迫切需求，本stc有一个直接的机会，将从基础科学和工程研究中获得的知识转移到该领域的实践者。除了通常的会议、论文集、期刊文章和课程传播模式外，通过STC开发的合作实验室双向学习和研究工具可以在学术合作伙伴和合作组织之间快速传播知识。

Center for Advanced Materials for Water Purification,University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (OIA-0120978)ABSTRACTThe U.S. and the world are facing the very real dangers of depleted aquifers, inadequate surface water supplies, and contamination from a variety of sources including agricultural runoff, industrial discharges, acid rain, and ground-water pollutants. Waterborne pathogens are also a growing threat for water supplies. These dangers are expected to increase as populations continue to grow. Numerous technologies are being implemented to purify water, but current membrane and adsorbent materials used in water purification are not sufficient to solve all contamination problems and meet increasingly stringent new standards being proposed to protect health. The best state-of-the-art materials have well-known shortcomings that are due to shortfalls in the current understanding of the underlying science. Indeed, to develop the revolutionary new materials and systems for safe and economical water-purification technology needed to counter the impending water crisis requires a coordinated, intensive, multi-year effort of scientists and engineers. The vision of this Center is to forge multi-disciplinary groups of researchers, educators, and practitioners into a cohesive team with the overarching goal of developing new functional materials and systems to purify water for the peoples of the United States and the world.This Science and Technology Center (STC) has several distinguishing features. First and foremost, it provides coordinated participation of researchers in the following areas: water quality at Stanford and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC), material science at UIUC, basic physical science (chemistry and physics) at the University of California at Berkeley, Clark Atlanta University, Stanford, and UIUC, and system-level experts at Stanford and UIUC. Furthermore, the Center facilitates the technology transfer and feedback from practitioners in water treatment through linkages with the UIUC Waste Management Research Center, and the Orange County (CA)Water District, as well as other water-quality organizations. Another distinguishing feature of the STC is its establishment of a collaborative laboratory (collaboratory) for its education, research, and outreach functions, to ensure the integration of the activities. In this multi-disciplinary collaboratory, chemists, material scientists, physicists, biologists, and engineers will work together with library and information-science experts in the Center to disseminate information and research results showing how to synthesize, characterize, and understand new material systems designed to separate compounds from water and/or transform them.The premise of this STC is that advanced, selective and efficient water-treatment technologies will be based on membrane filters, adsorbents, and catalytic surfaces. Rational development of the required materials requires a firm grasp of the basic science of the aqueous interface. The key issue is to observe and to manipulate on the Angstrom to nanometer scale interactions between the aqueous solution and the solid substrate. The goals of the STC are: (i) to advance the basic understanding of these interactions; (ii) to use the results to radically improve membranes, filters, adsorbents, and ion-exchange materials through the synthesis of new materials that are able to separate selectively and/or transform compounds in water; (iii) to integrate these new materials into viable water purification systems; and (iv) to integrate the human and knowledge infrastructure with the research mission to implement effectively the science and technology.To accomplish these goals, the STC is organized in four core teams: (i) Interfacial Processes and Molecular Characterization, (ii) Materials Synthesis and Development, (iii) System Analysis and Integration, and (iv) Collaboratory Education and Outreach.The Center supports education and outreach activities for: (i) K-12 teachers and students to learn why clean water is important and how fundamental research and sound engineering can help make water cleaner; (ii) underrepresented groups in science and engineering, encouraging members of such groups to pursue careers related to water purification, material science, and engineering; (iii) citizen groups, water industry professionals, and local governments to help formulate, debate, and implement policies related to water quality control; and (iv) the general public to understand the need for basic research on water purification. All constituent groups are supported by a web-based collaborative laboratory to support knowledge dissemination, mentoring, learning, public debate, and discussion. The main tool used for the collaboratory is the INQUIRY-based learning and research environment developed in the UIUC School of Library and Information Science, which allows two-way research and education to be conducted between the partners and all the participants and constituent groups of the Center.The STC seeks aggressively to increase diversity in education, research, and outreach.Diversity is essential for increasing the numbers of under-represented groups in science and technology. The STC can make the greatest impact if the knowledge and technologies developed are implemented throughout the U.S. and the world by diverse educators and researchers. To achieve this impact, the proposed STC haspartnered with the Environmental Technology Consortium (ETC) of historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) and other minority institutions (MIs) to increase minority participation. In addition, CAU is an active water-treatment research partner, which supports the training of a diverse group of students in water purification research.Due to the critical need for improved materials and processes for water purification, thisSTC has an immediate opportunity to transfer the knowledge gained from basic science and engineering research to the practitioners in the field. In addition to the usual modes of dissemination in conferences, proceedings, journal articles, and courses, the collaboratory two-way learning and research tools developed through the STC quickly transmit knowledge between the academic partners and the partner organizations.