Theses and Dissertations

Issuing Body

Mississippi State University

Advisor

Toghiani, Hossein

Committee Member

French, W. Todd

Committee Member

Elmore, Billy B.

Date of Degree

5-9-2015

Document Type

Graduate Thesis - Open Access

Major

Chemical Engineering

Degree Name

Master of Science

College

James Worth Bagley College of Engineering

Department

Dave C. Swalm School of Chemical Engineering

Abstract

Lignin is the most abundant natural aromatic polymer on the earth. In this work, lignin properties were studied in order to explore its use as a low cost carbon precursor for graphene production. Initial studies focused on kinetics of lignin pyrolysis using ‘Kissinger method’ and ‘ASTM E 1641’ using thermogravimetry. The values obtained for kinetic parameters varied for the two methods and activation energy increased with increase in lignin purity. Lignin was solvent fractionated, using three organic solvents to extract the high molecular weight fraction suitable for the production of highly ordered graphene nano platelets. Acetone and Methanol were successful in sequential fractionation. Finally, polycrystalline graphene was produced using Protobind 1000 and lignosulfonate lignins by carbonization. The acid purified graphene had relatively less catalytic material remaining, and nitric acid purification was successful compared to HCl purification. However, HNO3 purification introduced minor structural damages to the sample.

URI

https://hdl.handle.net/11668/18112

Comments

graphene||fractionation||kinetics||lignin

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