• Applied Chemistry for Engineering
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• v.31 no.3
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• pp.299-304
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• 2020

Nanoparticles play an important role as a catalyst in many chemical syntheses. Colloidal nanoparticles were usually synthesized with reducing, capping, and shape directing agents which induce surface poisoning of catalysts. A new green synthesis for silver nanoparticles was developed by utilizing less additives which could be a hazardous waste. A crystallization technique was employed to reduce the amount of reducing and capping agents during synthesis resulting in less surface poisoning of the nanoparticle. The synthesized Ag nanoparticles using monosaccharides and disaccharides as reducing agents could be used as a catalyst for the redox reaction of resazurin and the mechanism of the reaction using Ag nanoparticles was studied.

• Journal of Marine Bioscience and Biotechnology
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.133-142
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• 2022

The increased production and consumption of polyethylene terephthalate (PET)-based products over the past several decades has resulted in the discharge of countless tons of PET waste into the marine environment. PET microparticles resulting from the physical erosion of general PET wastes end up in the ocean and pose a threat to the marine biosphere and human health, necessitating the development of new technologies for recycling and upcycling. Notably, enzyme-mediated PET degradation is an appealing option due to its eco-friendly and energy-saving characteristics. PETase, a PET-hydrolyzing enzyme originating from Ideonella sakaiensis, is one of the most thoroughly researched biological catalysts. However, the industrial application of PETase-mediated PET recycling is limited due to the low stability and poor reusability of the enzyme. Here we developed the whole-cell catalyst (WCC) in which functional PETase is attached to the outer membrane of Escherichia coli. Immunoassays are used to identify the surface-expressed PETase, and we demonstrated that the WCC degraded PET microparticles most efficiently at 30℃ and pH 9 without agitation. Furthermore, the WCC increased the PET-degrading activity in a concentration-dependent manner, surpassing the limited activity of soluble PETase above 100 nM. Finally, we demonstrated that the WCC could be recycled up to three times.

• Journal of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.55 no.3
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• pp.430-435
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• 2011

Coal fly ash of thermal power plants converted into mesoporous materials MCM-41. The synthesized material was characterized by XRD, FT-IR, SEM, and EDS techniques. The catalytic activity of prepared material was studied for the synthesis of 5-arylindene malononitriles via Knoevenagel condensation of aromatic aldehydes and malonontrile is described. The features of present method are easy handling, stability, reusability, and eco-friendliness of catalyst, high yields, short reaction time, simple experimental and work up procedure.

• Journal of Soil and Groundwater Environment
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• v.27 no.1
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• pp.31-38
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• 2022

The common algae and industrial waste, chlorella and red mud, were co-pyrolyzed in carbon dioxide condition to fabricate iron-biochar composite. In order to investigate the direct effect of chlorella and red mud in the syngas generation and the property of biochar, experiments were performed using mixture samples of chlorella and red mud. The evolution of flammable gasses (H₂, CH₄, CO) was monitored during pyrolysis. The produced biochar composite was employed as a catalyst for persulfate activation for methylene blue removal. BET analysis indicated that the iron-biochar composite mainly possessed meso- and macropores. The XRD analysis revealed that hematite (Fe₂O₃) contained in red mud was transformed to Fe₃O₄ during co-pyrolysis. The composite effectively activated persulfate and removed methylene blue. Among the composite samples, the composite fabricated from the mixture composed of 1:2 chlorella:red mud showed the best performance in syngas generation and methylene blue removal.

• Applied Chemistry for Engineering
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.117-121
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• 2018

A stainless steel mesh was applied to the cathode of an electro-Fenton system. Methylene blue (MB) solution was chosen as the model waste water with non-biodegradable pollutants. For the model waste water, the degradation efficiency was compared among various SUS mesh cathodes with different surface treatments and magnetite coatings on them. With increasing amount of the magnetite coating on SUS mesh, the degradation efficiency also increased. The improved electro-catalytic characteristic was explained by the increased amount of in situ generated hydrogen peroxide near the cathode surface. Cyclic voltammetry data also showed improved electro-catalytic performance for SUS mesh with more magnetite coatings on them.

• Applied Chemistry for Engineering
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• v.23 no.4
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• pp.367-371
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• 2012

Waste printed circuit boards (WPCBs) contain valuable metals such as Cu, Ni, Au, Ag, and Pd. For an effective recycling of WPCBs, it is essential to recover the valuable metals. In recent years, recycling processes have come to be necessary for separating noble metals from WPCBs due to an increasing amount of electronic device wastes. However, it is well known that glass reinforced epoxy resins in the WPCBs are difficult materials to separate into elemental components, namely metals, glass fibers and epoxy resins in the chemical recycling process. $K_3PO_4$ as a catalyst in dimethylformamide (DMF) and N-Methyl-2-pyrrolidone (NMP) was used to depolymerize epoxy resins for recovering metallic and non-metallic components from WPCBs. Reactions of WPCBs were carried out at temperatures $160{\sim}200^{\circ}C$ for 2~12 h. The recycled glass fiber from WPCBs was analyzed by thermogravimetric analyzer (TGA) and evaluated the degree of solubility of the epoxy resin for separation efficiencies of the WPCBs.

• Applied Chemistry for Engineering
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• v.28 no.5
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• pp.559-564
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• 2017

In this study, the optimization process was carried out by using the central composite model of the response surface methodology in waste cooking oil based biodiesel production process. The acid value, reaction time, reaction temperature, methanol/oil molar ratio, and catalyst amount were selected process variables. The response was evaluated by measuring the FAME content (more than 96.5%) and kinematic viscosity (1.9~5.5 cSt). Through basic experiments, the range of optimum operation variables for the central composite model, such as reaction time, reaction temperature and methanol/oil molar ratio, were set as between 45 and 60 min, between 50 and $60^{\circ}C$, and between 8 and 12, respectively. The optimum operation variables, such as biodiesel production reaction time, temperature, and methanol/oil molar ratio deduced from the central composite model were 55.2 min, $57.5^{\circ}C$, and 10, respectively. With those conditions the results deduced from modeling were as followings: the predicted FAME content of the biodiesel and the kinematic viscosity of 97.5% and 2.40 cSt, respectively. We obtained experimental results with deduced operating variables mentioned above as followings: the FAME content and kinematic viscosity of 97.7% and 2.41 cSt, respectively. Error rates for the FAME content and kinematic viscosity were 0.23 and 0.29%, respectively. Therefore, the low error rate could be obtained when the central composite model among surface reaction methods was applied to the optimized production process of waste cooking oil raw material biodiesel.

• Applied Chemistry for Engineering
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• v.34 no.2
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• pp.126-130
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• 2023

In response to environmental demands, pyrolysis is one of the practical methods for obtaining reusable oils from waste plastics. However, the waste plastic pyrolysis oils (WPPO) are consumed as low-grade fuel oil due to their impurities. Thus, this study focused on the upgrading method to obtain naphtha catalytic cracking feedstocks from WPPO by the hydroprocessing, including hydrotreating and hydrocracking reaction. Especially, various transition metal sulfides supported catalysts were investigated as hydrotreating and hydrocracking catalysts. The catalytic performance was evaluated with a 250 ml-batch reactor at 370~400 ℃ and 6.0 MPa H₂. Sulfur-, nitrogen-, and chlorine-compounds in WPPO were well eliminated with nickel-molybdenum/alumina catalysts. The NiMo/ZSM-5 catalyst has the highest naphtha yield.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.10 no.9
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• pp.2390-2395
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• 2009

In the condition of GHSV=$30000\;hr^{-1}$, $NO_x$ removal yield was higher as mole ratio of $SiO_2/Al_2O_3$ for Fe/ZSM-5 was lower regardless of preparation method such as CVD (chemical vapor deposition) and dry impregnation. In addition to this, Fe/ZSM-5 catalyst showed about 50% $NO_x$ removal yield between $350^{\circ}C$ - $400^{\circ}C$ while CO formed significantly. To remove newly formed CO over Fe/ZSM-5, Co-Pt/ZSM-5 was used in conjunction with Fe/ZSM-5 in the series and this demonstrated over 90% removal yield of both NOx and CO at $250^{\circ}C$ and GHSV=$30000\;hr^{-1}$.

• Resources Recycling
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• v.28 no.5
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• pp.60-67
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• 2019

A valuable metal recovery from waste resources such as spent rechargeable secondary batteries is of critical issues because of a sharp increase in the amount of waste resources. In this context, it is necessary to research not only recycling waste lithium-ion batteries (LIBs), but also reusing valuable metals (e.g., Li, Co, Ni, Mn etc.) recovered from waste LIBs. In particular, the lithium hydroxide ($LiOH{\cdot}xH_2O$), which is of precursors that can be prepared by the recovery of Li in waste LIBs, can be reused as a catalyst, a carbon dioxide absorbent, and again as a precursor for cathode materials of LIB. However, most studies of recycling the waste LIBs have been focused on the preparation of lithium carbonate with a recovery of Li. Herein, we show the preparation of high purity lithium hydroxide powder along with the precipitation process, and the systematic study to find an optimum condition is also carried out. The lithium carbonate, which is recovered from waste LIBs, was used as starting materials for synthesis of lithium hydroxide. The optimum precipitation conditions for the preparation of LiOH were found as follows: based on stirring, reaction temperature $90^{\circ}C$, reaction time 3 hr, precursor ratio 1:1. To synthesize uniform and high purity lithium hydroxide, 2-step precipitation process was additionally performed, and consequently, high purity $LiOH{\cdot}xH_2O$ powder was obtained.