Transformations in the properties of low-moisture dough products (cookies and crackers) during baking have been studied under idealized conditions in pilot facilities and laboratories. However, little research is published that describes dough development within the context of complex industrial baking processes. A process mapping approach was adopted, in which oven parameters were profiled and matched against changes in dough. In cookies, changes to starch A-granules, including loss of granule birefringence, disruption to granule borders and increased gel viscosity were observed. Development of acrylamide in cookies was seen to trail colour development, suggesting options for mediating acrylamide content. In crackers, the presence of additional water allowed significant changes to starch A-granules to occur, including: swelling similar to the early stages of gelatinization in bread, reduced pasting ability, a drop in enthalpy, and a loss of crystallinity. Emulation of low-moisture dough baking at the benchtop level, based upon internal product temperature data from industrial processes, was found to be limited in its ability to produce crackers having appropriate leavening and internal structure development. The determination of isosteric heat of desorption values for cookies and crackers, modeled on industrial processes at temperatures > 100°C, gave values of 44.3 and 42.7 kJ/mol, respectively. This data will be useful for establishing energy requirements in industrial baking processes / MITACS, OMAFRA

Metal-Organic Materials (MOMs) represent an important class of solid-state crystalline materials. Their countless attractive attributes make them uniquely suited to potentially resolve many present and future utilitarian societal challenges ranging from energy and the environment, all the way to include biology and medicine. Since the birth of coordination chemistry, the self-assembly of organic molecules with metal ions has produced a plethora of simple and complex architectures, many of which possess diverse pore and channel systems in a periodic array. In its infancy however this field was primarily fueled by burgeoning serendipitous discoveries, with no regard to a rational design approach to synthesis. In the late 1980s, the field was transformed when the potential for design was introduced through the seminal studies conducted by Hoskins and Robson who transcended the pivotal works of Wells into the experimental regime. The construction of MOMs using metal-ligand directed assembly is often regarded as the origin of the molecular building block (MBB) approach, a rational design strategy that focuses on the self-assembly of pre-designed MBBs having desired shapes and geometries to generate structures with intended topologies by exploiting the diverse coordination modes and geometries afforded by metal ions and organic molecules. The evolution of the MBB approach has witnessed tremendous breakthroughs in terms of scale and porosity by simply replacing single metal ions with more rigid inorganic metal clusters whilst preserving the inherent modularity and essential geometrical attributes needed to construct target networks for desired applications. The work presented in this dissertation focuses upon the rational design and synthesis of a diverse collection of open frameworks constructed from pre-fabricated rigid inorganic MBBs (i.e. [M(CO2)4], [M2(RCO2)4], [M3O(RCO2)6], MN3O3, etc), supermolecular building blocks (SBBs) and 3-, 4- and 6-connected organic MBBs. A systematic evaluation concerning the effect of various structural parameters (i.e. pore size and shape, metal ion, charge, etc) on hydrogen uptake and the relative binding affinity of H2-MOF interactions for selected systems is provided.

Multiwalled carbon nanotubes (MWNTs) have attracted great interest during thelast decade due to their possession of a unique set of properties. In addition totheir strength, MWNTs have well defined morphologies, with large aspect ratiosand pores in the meso range, and intriguing transport properties, such as highelectrical and thermal conductivity.We are interested in how variations in the MWNT morphology affect areas ofpossible engineering applications. We have identified morphology as a criticalelement for the performance of MWNTs in engineering applications. Specificareas studied and reported here spans from surface adsorption and capillarycondensation, to dispersion and dispersion processes, and transport propertiesin relation to MWNT aspect ratio. This wide range of exploration is typicallyneeded for evaluating opportunities for new materials.MWNTs can be used in different types of adsorption systems and it should bepossible to tailor the MWNT morphology to suit a specific adsorption process.We found that the major part of butane, our model gas, adsorbs on the externalMWNT and only a small fraction ends up in the pores.The unusually large aspect ratio makes MWNTs ideal as fillers in polymermatrixes. Since MWNTs are electrically conductive, it is possible to align theMWNTs in the matrix before curing. We investigated the effect of AC-fields onaqueous MWNT dispersions and the possibility to align MWNTs in an electricalfield.It is also necessary to develop suitable dispersion methods, to enable theproduction of homogeneous dispersions and composites. We studied a numberof different mechanical dispersion methods and their effect on the MWNTmorphology.