Uranyl Mesoporous Materials Alex Burum

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Uranyl Mesoporous Materials Alex
Burum
Notre Dame

• Dr. Peter Burns
• Ginger Sigmon
• University of Notre Dame-Summer 2006 REU

EMSI
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Notre Dame
EMSI

• Overview
• Background
• Synthesis
• Results

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Notre Dame
EMSI

• Why mesoporous materials?
• Mesoporous materials have pore sizes 20-500Å
• Zeolites are limited to 15Å pore sizes
• Applications
• Catalysts
• Molecular Sieves

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Notre Dame
EMSI

• Why uranyl mesoporous materials?
• Use of depleted uranium
• Materials
• New catalyst for environmental breakdown
• Nuclear waste form

enriched 235 U 0.7
depleted 238 U 99.3
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Hierarchy of Uranyl Crystal Chemistry
Notre Dame
EMSI
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Synthesis
Notre Dame
EMSI

• Anions uranyl nitrate surfactant urea
  water U mesoporous material
• (1-x) (x)
  2 30 60

• (NH2)2CO 3H2O 2NH4 2OH- CO2

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Synthesis
Notre Dame
EMSI

• Anions uranyl nitrate surfactant urea
  water U mesoporous material
• (1-x) (x)
  2 30 60

Surfactant
Uranyl material
QuickTime and a
TIFF (Uncompressed) decompressor
are needed to see this picture.
1. Condensation of micellar walls 2.
Removal of surfactant
Zeolitic structure Mesopores
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Synthesis
Notre Dame
EMSI

• Anions uranyl nitrate surfactant urea
  water U mesoporous material
• (1-x) (x)
  2 30 60

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Results
Notre Dame
EMSI
Before PXRD
1 2 3 4
5 6 7

2 ?
After PXRD
1 2 3 4
5 6 7

2 ?
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Results
Notre Dame
EMSI
100mm
10mm
keV
10mm
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Future Work
Notre Dame
EMSI

• TEM transmission electron microscopy

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Acknowledgements
Notre Dame
EMSI

• Thank you to
• Dr. Burns
• Ginger Sigmon
• Everyone in the Lab
• University of Notre Dame EMSI