Acquisition and Customization of a Facility for the In-situ X-ray Structural Analysis of Nanomaterials

这项研究将在普渡大学建立一个小角度x射线散射设备，用于表征催化剂和其他纳米材料。定制的小角度x射线散射仪（SAXS）和超小角度x射线散射仪（USAXS）将与环境室一起开发，为现场分析提供温度、压力和气相组成的控制。小角度和超小角度的x射线散射提供了关于区域尺寸、形状和分形维数的有价值的定量结构信息。由于获得了丰富的信息，小角度x射线散射（带衍射）可以导致新的纳米材料的快速发展，包括非均相催化剂，有序纳米孔薄膜，氧化物基纳米颗粒，金属纳米团簇和自组装嵌段共聚物。然而，高效的材料开发需要直接使用x射线散射仪器，以便为合理的纳米材料合成提供即时反馈。该机构将受益的许多研究工作都有可能对社会产生广泛影响。例如，用于燃料电池催化的新型纳米结构电极和低成本的自组装纳米结构光伏材料有可能减少社会对不可再生资源的依赖，并实现未来的氢经济。新型纳米结构热电材料有可能彻底改变冷却行业，金属纳米颗粒结构可能导致等离子体传感器能够检测广泛的生物和化学制剂的单分子。所有这些努力都需要纳米结构材料的快速x射线表征，并且将从所提出的仪器中受益匪浅。由此产生的设施将为校园和地区研究人员提供独特而强大的仪器，这将使下一代纳米材料和催化剂的开发成为可能。

This research will establish a small angle x-ray scattering facility at Purdue University for characterization of catalysts and other nanomaterials. A customized small angle x-ray scattering (SAXS) instrument and an ultra small angle x-ray scattering instrument (USAXS) will be developed with environmental chambers that provide control of temperature, pressure, and gas-phase composition for in situ analysis. X-ray scattering at small and ultra small angles provides valuable quantitative structural information about domain size, shape, and fractal dimension. Due to the wealth of information obtained, small angle x-ray scattering (with diffraction) can lead to the rapid development of new nanomaterials including heterogeneous catalysts, ordered nanoporous thin films, oxide-based nanoparticles, metal nanoclusters, and self-assembled block copolymers. However, efficient materials development requires direct access to x-ray scattering instrumentation in order to provide immediate feedback for rational nanomaterials synthesis. Many of the research efforts that the facility will benefit have the potential to broadly impact society. For example, novel nanostructured electrodes for fuel cell catalysis and low-cost self-assembled nanostructured photovoltaic materials have the potential to reduce society's dependence on non-renewable resources and enable the hydrogen economy of the future. Novel nanostructured thermoelectric materials have the potential to revolutionize the cooling industry, and metal nanoparticle structures could lead to plasmonic sensors capable of detecting single molecules of a wide spectrum of biological and chemical agents. All of these endeavors require the rapid x-ray characterization of nanostructured materials and will greatly benefit from the proposed instrument. The resulting facility will provide unique and powerful instruments to campus and regional researchers that will enable the development of the next generation of nanomaterials and catalysts.