Exploring the response of a resistive soot sensor to AC electric excitation

The resistive particulate matter sensor is a simple device that transduces the presence of soot through impedance change across inter-digital electrodes (IDEs). We investigate the information provided by impedance spectroscopy over the frequency range from 100 Hz to 10 kHz for two purposes. The first is to investigate the opportunities for an...

Flocculation of clay suspensions by anionic and cationic polyelectrolytes: A systematic analysis

The characteristics of clayey suspensions, majorly composed of quartz microparticles, in the presence of anionic and cationic polyelectrolytes were investigated using different techniques. A wide range of clay concentrations was used, i.e., from 0.07 to 1000 g/L for different experimental techniques, based on the fact that the clay...

Performance enhancement of reduced graphene oxide-modified carbon electrodes for vanadium redox-flow systems

Reduced graphene oxide (rGO) suspended in an N,N′-dimethylformamide (DMF) solvent underwent electrophoretic deposition (EPD) on carbon paper (CP) electrodes. X-ray computed micro-tomography (XMT) indicates a 24 % increase in the specific surface area of CP modified with rGO in comparison to the untreated sample. Furthermore, XMT confirms that...

Onsager’s reciprocal relations for electroacoustic and sedimentation: Application to (concentrated) colloidal suspensions

In this article, the relations for electroacoustic phenomena, such as sedimentation potential, sedimentation intensity, colloid vibration potential, colloid vibration intensity/current, or electric sonic amplitude, are given, on the basis of irreversible thermodynamics. This formalism allows in particular to discuss the different expressions for...

Onsager's reciprocal relations for electroacoustic and sedimentation: Application to (concentrated) colloidal suspensions

In this article, the relations for electroacoustic phenomena, such as sedimentation potential, sedimentation intensity, colloid vibration potential, colloid vibration intensity/current, or electric sonic amplitude, are given, on the basis of irreversible thermodynamics. This formalism allows in particular to discuss the different expressions for...

Electrokinetics in Low Salinity Waterflooding

Low salinity waterflooding (LSF) is a promising improved oil recovery (IOR) technique. The enhanced composition of injected water in LSF can change the wettability of the formation from oil-wet/ mixed-wet towards a more water-wet state. This leads to improved relative oil permeability (kro). The zeta potential, which is the electric potential at...

Electrophoretic mobility of latex nanospheres in electrolytes: Experimental challenges

The electrophoretic mobility of sulfate latex nanospheres (radius 300 ± 10 nm) was measured as a function of ionic strength for different salts. The results were obtained from two similar instruments (Malvern ZetaSizer 3000 HSa and Malvern ZetaSizer Nano) using the same dispersions, in the same conditions. The values predicted from the standard...

Improving the d33 and g33 properties of 0-3 piezoelectric composites by dielectrophoresis

Composites of piezoelectric particles in a polymer matrix with enhanced properties in the poling direction were prepared by dielectrophoretic alignment of the particles. The effect of processing parameters such as the amplitude and frequency of the applied electric field and the viscosity of the matrix on the dielectric and piezoelectric...

Bioparticle Separation in Microfluidic Devices for in-Line Application

There was an explosive growth in the bioprocess industry market during the last decade. The tight control of these processes is often very critical in order to optimize the process efficiency or even achieve the right product. Capillary electrophoresis (CE) system is a good option for process monitoring and controlling, since it has already been...

Microchip electrophoresis for UVC-induced DNA damage assessment

In this thesis a design is presented which main objectives are to improve the speed, sensitivity and resolution of the commonly used gel electrophoresis method. To this end a background study is performed to look at the differences and similarities between both gel and micro-chip electrophoresis. Based on these findings some calculations are...

Exploiting and exploring microtubules and kinesin motor proteins in nanofabricated devices

This thesis describes experimental work at the interface of nanotechnology and biology. We combine fabrication techniques from nanotechnology with motor proteins from the biological cell. Motor proteins are fascinating protein complexes with nanometer dimensions that are involved in force generation and motion inside cells. One intriguing...

Conductivity detection for application in capillary electrophoresis microchips

Orthogonal-field-alternation gel electrophoresis banding patterns of DNA from yeasts

Chromosomal DNAs from various yeast species were separated by orthogonal-field-alternation gel electrophoresis (OFAGE). To this end we developed a spheroplasting and lysis method to obtain intact DNA from both ascomycetous and basidiomycetous yeasts. The OFAGE banding patterns of22 ascomycetous and four basidiomycetous yeast strains were...