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Access Type
WSU Access
Date of Award
January 2022
Degree Type
Dissertation
Degree Name
Ph.D.
Department
Chemical Engineering and Materials Science
First Advisor
Da Deng
Abstract
Human society is encountered significant interrelated challenges, including environmental pollution, depletion of nonrenewable energy sources, and threats to human health. Researchers try to develop techniques that help eliminate toxic substances from the environment and replace nonrenewable energy sources (e.g., fossil fuels) with renewable energy sources (e.g., solar and wind) in order to reduce the emission of greenhouse gases and CO2 into the atmosphere. These naturally fluctuating intermittent energy sources need reliable energy storage systems such as batteries to buffer the fluctuation. Batteries are also widely used in zero-emission electric vehicles. Performances of batteries are determined by electrode materials selected. Therefore, synthesizing novel materials that can promote the performance of the batteries is crucial in developing next-generation batteries. Cancer is another challenge that faces humans worldwide. Photothermal therapy needs new efficient nanomaterials that convert light to heat and destroy cancer cells. Thus, it is a scientifically interesting but intellectually challenging task to design facile and scalable approaches for developing multifunctional structured materials for energy, environmental and biomedical applications.This dissertation aims to develop multifunctional hollow nanostructures for energy, biomedical and environmental applications. We synthesized hollow nanostructures of cocoon-like carbon encapsulating porous and magnetic cores as an anode material for lithium-ion batteries and an adsorbent for toxic organic compounds removal from wastewater. We demonstrated that hollow cocoon-like structures could be used as high-capacity anodes for advanced lithium-ion batteries to significantly improve the electrochemical performances of batteries. Moreover, we reported an active template-assisted approach to preparing amorphous low aspect-ratio carbon nanotubes (L-CNTs). The as-prepared L-CNTs demonstrated promising performances when tested for highly stable lithium metal anodes and biomedical compatibility evaluation. Additionally, a novel nanostructure of voids-at-the-tips in prolate ellipsoids of carbon-wrapped crystalline cores was developed for environmental and biomedical applications. This hollow nanostructure could effectively convert the NIR light (808 nm) irradiation to heat and increase the temperature of the aqueous solution. The effective NIR light absorption of the hollow nanostructure demonstrates that it can be a promising agent for photothermal therapy of cancer cells. The current work demonstrates that hollow nanostructures with unique shapes and properties can be designed and developed to potentially address energy, environmental and biomedical challenges.
Recommended Citation
Rouhollahi, Foroogh, "Novel Design And Facile Synthesis Of Multifunctional Hollow Nanostructures For Biomedical, Energy, And Environmental Applications" (2022). Wayne State University Dissertations. 3741.
https://digitalcommons.wayne.edu/oa_dissertations/3741