Master of Science / Department of Mechanical and Nuclear Engineering / Steven J. Eckels / Christopher M. Sorensen / Large specific surface areas and high concentrations of reactive edge and defect sites make NanoActive™ metal oxide powders ideal chemical adsorbents. These powders are dispersed in aerosol form to remediate toxic wastes and neutralize chemical and biological warfare agents. In the destructive adsorption of toxic chemicals, effective application requires particles be as small as possible, thus, maximizing surface area and number of edge and defect sites. Other applications, e.g. smoke clearing, require particles be large so they will settle in a timely manner. Ideally, particle size control could be engineered into powder dispersion devices. The purpose of this study was to explore particle cohesion and aerodynamic deaggregation mechanisms to enhance the design of powder dispersion devices. An aerosol generator and four experimental nozzles were designed to explore the most commonly referenced deaggregation mechanisms: particle acceleration, particles in shear and turbulent flows, and particle impaction. The powders were then dispersed through the nozzles with increasing flow rates. A small angle light scattering device was used to make in situ particle size measurements. The nozzle designed for impaction deaggregated the NanoActive™ MgO particles to a lesser degree than the other three nozzles, which deaggregated the particles to a similar degree. Flows in three of the four nozzles were simulated in a commercial computational fluid dynamics package. Theoretical particle and aggregate stresses from the literature were calculated using simulated data. These calculations suggest particle acceleration causes internal stresses roughly three orders of magnitude larger than shear and turbulent flows. These calculations, coupled with experimental data, lead to the conclusion that acceleration was the most significant cause of particle deaggregation in these experiments. Experimental data also identified the dependence of deaggregation on primary particle size and agglomerate structure. NanoActive™ powders with smaller primary particles exhibited higher resistance to deaggregation. Small primary particle size was thought to increase the magnitude of van der Waals interactions. These interactions were modeled and compared to theoretical deaggregation stresses previously mentioned. In conclusion, deaggregation is possible. However, the ideas of particle size control and a universal dispersion device seem elusive considering the material dependent nature of deaggregation.

"The next generation of aluminum alloys will have to operate at temperatures approaching 300°C. Traditional aluminum alloys cannot perform at these temperatures, but aluminum alloys reinforced with fine ceramic particles can. The objective of this research is to develop a process to synthesize Al-TiC composites by the Rotating Impeller Gas-Liquid In-situ method. This method relies on injecting methane into molten aluminum that has been pre-alloyed with titanium. The gas is introduced by means of a rotating impeller into the molten alloy, and under the correct conditions of temperature, gas flow, and rotation speed, it reacts preferentially with titanium to form titanium carbide particles. The design of the apparatus, the multi-physics phenomena underlying the mechanism responsible for particle formation and size control, and the operation window for the process are first elucidated. Then a parametric study that leads to the synthesis of aluminum reinforced with TiC microparticles and nanoparticles is described. Finally, potential technical obstacles that may stand in the way of commercializing the process are discussed and ways to overcome them are proposed. "