Explore the Nano World
Wen's Research Group
Wen Zhang, Ph.D., P.E., BCEE
Principal Investigator
Professor
Phone: (973) 596-5520
Fax: (973) 596-5790
Email: wen.zhang@njit.edu
Office Location: Colton Hall 211
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Congratulations to Fangzhou Liu for successfully defending his master’s thesis!
On April 2nd, 2020, Fangzhou Liu successfully defended his master’s thesis with many supports from committee members (Dr. Wen Zhang, Dr. Xianqin Wang and Dr. Lucia Rodriguez-Freire). Fangzhou’s research focuses on “Enhanced Removal of Perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) via Microwave-Fenton-Reactive Membrane Filtration”. This study is based on our patent-granted technology of the microwave-assistant catalytic membrane filtration. The PFOA removal was assessed in a continuous filtration process with and without microwave irradiation. The results show that PFOA adsorbed on membrane and catalyst materials and fully penetrated the membrane filter after reaching adsorption equilibrium. Under microwave irradiation (7.2 watt·cm-2), approximately 65.9% of PFOA (25 μg·L-1) in the feed solution was degraded within a hydraulic time of 2 min (at the permeate flow rate of 43 LMH) due to the microwave-Fenton like reactions. In addition, low flow rates and moderate catalyst coating densities are critical for optimizing PFOA removal. Finally, potential degradation mechanisms of PFOA were proposed through the analysis of degradation by-products (e.g., PFPeA).
We gratefully acknowledge funding support from the United States Department of Interior via Bureau of Reclamation (Agreement number: R19AC00106), EPA SBIR phase I grant (Federal Contract #: 68HERD19C0014.), 2017-2018 NJIT Faculty Seed Grant (FSG), and Undergraduate Research and Innovation (URI) Phase I and II Seed Grants.