INFEWS N/P/H2O: Fundamentals of N2/O2 plasma and heterogeneous catalysis

1606062 PI：GravesTitle：INFEWS N/P/H2O：N2/O2等离子体和多相催化的基本原理本项目旨在推进空气等离子体技术，以大大减少人类对全球氮循环的干扰。重点将是建立必要的科学基础，有效地耦合非平衡氮/氧等离子体与非均相催化剂，以有效地形成一氧化氮（NO）。 如果有效的空气等离子体可以产生一氧化氮（NO），则其可以容易地转化为一氧化氮（NO2），然后通过水吸收转化为硝酸（HNO 3）。硝酸可用于捕获细菌降解有机废物时产生的逃逸性氨（NH3）。氨在低pH下以硝酸铵（NH 4 NO3）的形式被捕获，从而大大提高了有机肥料的氮值，并避免了氨排放的破坏性环境影响。这项技术将特别有前途，因为等离子体可以由电力驱动，而电力可以在废物产生地点（如农场）以分布式、可再生的方式产生。该技术不是与传统的哈伯-博世NH3制造技术竞争，而是寻求减少对远离其使用的集中工厂制造的合成肥料的需求。非平衡等离子体可以通过降低氮解离的活化能而充当均相催化剂。通过添加非均相催化剂可以大大改善该过程，但对潜在的机制知之甚少。拟议的项目将采用高真空下的自由基束-表面研究和调制束质谱法，研究一系列金属和金属氧化物材料和表面温度下的自由基-表面催化相互作用。这些研究的数据将被用来开发参数化的网站平衡模型，可以提供洞察近大气压力的非平衡氮/氧等离子体的催化表面的存在下的研究。等离子体在这一应用中的成功实施可能有助于推动其他等离子体电催化技术的研究。除了培养研究生外，PI还计划从妇女和少数民族项目中招收本科生。还提出了一个涉及等离子体演示装置的中学生推广计划。

1606062 PI: GravesTitle: INFEWS N/P/H2O: Fundamentals of N2/O2 plasma and heterogeneous catalysisThis project aims to advance air plasma technology in order to substantially reduce human perturbation to the global nitrogen cycle. The focus will be on establishing the scientific foundation necessary to efficiently couple non-equilibrium nitrogen/oxygen plasmas with heterogeneous catalysts in order to efficiently form nitric oxide (NO). If efficient air plasmas can create nitric oxide (NO), this can be readily transformed to nitogen oxide (NO2) and then to nitric acid (HNO3) by water absorption. Nitric acid could be used to trap otherwise fugitive ammonia (NH3), created when bacteria degrade organic waste. The ammonia is trapped at low pH as ammonium nitrate (NH4NO3), thus greatly increasing the nitrogen value of the organic fertilizer and avoiding the damaging environmental effects of the ammonia emission. The technology would be especially promising because the plasma can be powered by electricity that could be generated in a distributed, renewable fashion at the location of the waste generation, such as the farm. Rather than compete with conventional Haber-Bosch NH3 manufacturing technology, this technology seeks to reduce the need for synthetic fertilizers made in centralized plants far from their use. Non-equilibrium plasmas can act as a homogeneous catalyst by lowering the activation energy of nitrogen dissociation. This process can be substantially improved by the addition of heterogeneous catalysts, but the underlying mechanisms are poorly understood. The proposed project will employ radical beam - surface studies under high vacuum and modulated beam mass spectrometry to study radical-surface catalytic interactions for a range of metal and metal oxide materials and surface temperatures. The data from these studies will be used to develop parameterized site balance models that can provide insights into near-atmospheric pressure studies of non-equilibrium nitrogen/oxygen plasmas in the presence of catalytic surfaces. The successful implementation of plasmas for this application could help motivate studies of other plasma electro-catalytic technologies. In addition to training graduate students, the PI plans to recruit undergraduate students from programs that engage women and minorities. An outreach program to middle school students involving plasma demonstration devices is also proposed.