Abstract
The production of carbon materials from renewable biofeedstocks is rapidly expanding with commercial applications in the areas of advanced materials, energy storage, and biochemicals. Present-day challenges exist in understanding how the distribution of monomeric units in lignin feedstocks impacts the structure and properties of carbon composites as a function of processing. This research investigates the effect of lignin feedstock and processing conditions on the structure of carbon composites. X-ray data was collected at a synchrotron source for lignin from hardwood, softwood, and grass feedstocks, processed under varying temperature and environmental conditions. The relative abundance of the principal monomeric units—guaiacyl, p-hydroxyphenyl, and syringyl—varies with feedstock and result in reproducible variations in the x-ray data. Statistical analyses for over fifty carbon materials were performed to determine the influence of feedstock, reduction temperature, and furnace humidity. The changes in the pair distribution function correspond to changes in material structure. Taken together, the analyses support the observation that graphitic structures form and grow in size with increasing reduction temperature. The characteristic size of the graphitic crystallites varies with feedstock, with kraft softwood and organosolv switchgrass leading to carbon composites with larger graphitic domains.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 856-869 |
| Number of pages | 14 |
| Journal | Carbon |
| Volume | 161 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - May 2020 |
| Externally published | Yes |
Funding
This manuscript has been authored by UT-Battelle, LLC under Contract No. DE-AC05-00OR22725 with the U.S. Department of Energy. The United States Government retains and the publisher, by accepting the article for publication, acknowledges that the United States Government retains a non-exclusive, paid-up, irrevocable, world-wide license to publish or reproduce the published form of this manuscript, or allow others to do so, for United States Government purposes. The Department of Energy will provide public access to these results of federally sponsored research in accordance with the DOE Public Access Plan ( http://energy.gov/downloads/doe-public-access-plan ). The authors would like to thank Dr. K. Chapman who assisted with data collection at APS beamline 11-ID-B at Argonne National Laboratory through research proposal 2017-GUP54614. Use of the Advancement Photon Source, an Office of Science User Facility operated by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Science by Argonne National Laboratory, was supported by the U.S. DOE under Contract No. DE-AC02-06CH11357 . Experimental design on KSW to specific carbonization test was performed by students from MSE department at UT-Knoxville: J. Sutton, D. San Roman, A. Thomas, D. Kitsmiller, A. Affolter, and Dr. C. Wetteland. Thanks to Ms. L. Yu, CRC UT-Knoxville, for reproducing KSW material. Thanks to Dr. N. M. Cantillo and Dr. G.A. Goenaga, CBE department UT-Knoxville, for BET experiments. Lastly, special thanks to Dr. J. Dunlap and Dr. G. Duscher from the Joint Institute for Advanced Materials facilities for the operation and support of TEM . This research was supported by a grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture National Institute of Food and Agriculture Nanotechnology Program award number 2017-67021-26599 . D.P. Harper acknowledges support from the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture , Hatch Project 1012359 . The authors would like to thank Dr. K. Chapman who assisted with data collection at APS beamline 11-ID-B at Argonne National Laboratory through research proposal 2017-GUP54614. Use of the Advancement Photon Source, an Office of Science User Facility operated by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Science by Argonne National Laboratory, was supported by the U.S. DOE under Contract No. DE-AC02-06CH11357. Experimental design on KSW to specific carbonization test was performed by students from MSE department at UT-Knoxville: J. Sutton, D. San Roman, A. Thomas, D. Kitsmiller, A. Affolter, and Dr. C. Wetteland. Thanks to Ms. L. Yu, CRC UT-Knoxville, for reproducing KSW material. Thanks to Dr. N. M. Cantillo and Dr. G.A. Goenaga, CBE department UT-Knoxville, for BET experiments. Lastly, special thanks to Dr. J. Dunlap and Dr. G. Duscher from the Joint Institute for Advanced Materials facilities for the operation and support of TEM. This research was supported by a grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture National Institute of Food and Agriculture Nanotechnology Program award number 2017-67021-26599. D.P. Harper acknowledges support from the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture, Hatch Project 1012359. This manuscript has been authored by UT-Battelle, LLC under Contract No. DE-AC05-00OR22725 with the U.S. Department of Energy. The United States Government retains and the publisher, by accepting the article for publication, acknowledges that the United States Government retains a non-exclusive, paid-up, irrevocable, world-wide license to publish or reproduce the published form of this manuscript, or allow others to do so, for United States Government purposes. The Department of Energy will provide public access to these results of federally sponsored research in accordance with the DOE Public Access Plan (http://energy.gov/downloads/doe-public-access-plan).
| Funders | Funder number |
|---|---|
| DOE Public Access Plan | |
| MSE department | |
| U.S. DOE | |
| U.S. Department of Agriculture National Institute of Food and Agriculture Nanotechnology Program | |
| United States Government | |
| U.S. Department of Energy | DE-AC02-06CH11357 |
| National Institute of Food and Agriculture | DE-AC05-00OR22725, 1012359, 2017-67021-26599 |
| Office of Science | |
| Argonne National Laboratory | 2017-GUP54614 |