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Draft: The 12th U.S.-Korea Forum on Nanotechnology:
Nanotechnology Applications for Water and
Nanotechnology Applications using 2-D materials
Washington, D.C.
Adopted on October 6, 2015
The
first decade of the 21st century has been characterized by the advent
of nanotechnology convergence and its application in a broad spectrum of
science and technology areas along with interdisciplinary research initiatives
to achieve rapid progress toward second industrial revolution. For this
purpose, the United States (National Science Foundation, NSF) and Korea
(Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning) have been vigorously encouraging
a common platform for the exchange of ideas and research collaboration in
nanotechnology through these Forums, set up by the recommendations made by the
Korea-US joint committee on Scientific and Technological Cooperation (held on
October 31, 2002 in Seoul).
Ever
since then, our Forums have been extremely successful, flourishing the over the
decade of their organization history via promoting tremendous development in
nanotechnology. These Forums have been a testimony to the transformative power
of identifying a concept or trend and laying out a vision at the synergistic
confluence of diverse scientific research areas. Our Forums have successfully provided a
common platform for effective networking between research communities and
industries in both countries by identifying emerging areas in nanotechnology
which generate huge impact. This is evident from major collaboration initiatives
between US and Korea, established via our Forums. Organizing the Forums has
significantly expedited the generation of cutting edge technologies for the
thrust areas in both countries. These
Forums have been well publicized through Carnegie Mellon website: http://www.cmu.edu/nanotechnology-forum/.
The
first Forum, held in Seoul on October 14 & 15, 2003, was attended by
amazingly large audience of 250 participants from both countries when nanotechnology
was at its infancy. Since then, our Forums have been annually held alternatively
in the US and Korea with an attendance of 986 (344 presenters and 642
nanoscience experts) in a broad range of nanotechnology related scientific and
policy areas during the past 12 years and covered a variety of timely topics. The
most recent Eleventh Forum was held on September 28 & 29, 2014 in Seoul
National University in Korea and brought in a new era of progress in
nanotechnology applications. The Forum covered various presentations and
discussions on timely topics ranging from nanoinformatics, nanocomposites, and
nanomanufacturing. This Forum provided an opportunity to realize the promise of
nanotechnology through the development of innovative and sustainable
nanomanufacturing technologies for producing novel strong, light and smart
nanocomposites and their management via nanoinformatics. These technologies
will lead to paradigm shift to next
generation enhanced performance of products in a broad range of industries
including aerospace, automotive, energy, environmental remediation,
information, and power industries as well as development of new industries and
the establishment of funding initiatives.
The
present Twelfth Forum was held at Washington D.C. on October 4-6, 2015, and was
attended by 61 eminent scientists and policy makers in the field of
nanotechnology (28 presenters). This Forum, which was held near the NSF, focused
on laying out a roadmap for a new paradigm in nanoscience-convergence in 2-D materials
and for water purification via exploring improvements to technological tools
for the application of nanotechnology and functional and novel nanomaterials to
water-related topics. Building on the successes of the previous Forum, the
first topic that the Twelfth Forum focused on current state-of-the-art research
and development of novel functional materials for new generation purification
membranes, enabling sensors and monitoring systems for aqueous environments and
other applications that advance global and societal needs pertaining to water
quality, water purification, and water re-use. The discussions on this topic
led to identification of “step-change” materials for highly fouling resistant
water purification membranes that provide a paradigm shift in performance at
economical costs compared to conventional reverse osmosis membranes. This topic
is an extremely important area for both countries due to the record water
shortage and draught being faced by regions in US, as well as the world. The
second area focused in this Forum is the development of innovative, sustainable,
and multiscale nano-manufacturing via bottom up methods related to novel 2-D
materials such as graphene. The sub-group discussions in the Twelfth Forum
identified challenges in a specific set of nanotechnology applications, such as
electronics, functional materials & sensors, and recommended various milestones
to government agencies in both countries including for development of new
products and processes that use these novel 2-D materials.
The following are the general recommendations of this Forum:
(1) Topic of next Forum:
a. Brain-like devices and sensor
b. Other timely topics agreed by both organizing committees
(2) Immediate collaboration: Tentative projects and collaborated teams are listed in sub-group reports.
a. Nanotechnology applications for water (one large team with four sub-topics)
b. Nanotechnology applications for 2-D (eight teams)
(3) Goals to be achieved:
a. Networking of excellence between US and Korea
b. Educations and training modules in supporting materials including online
The following are recommendations made by the two subgroups:
Sub-group 1: Nanotechnology Applications using 2-D
Challenges and Applications
Precise multi-scale heterogeneous nanomanufacturing of different 2-D materials using bottom up and top down with diversity in size, composition, properties and doping on the same substrate? Controllably exfoliation and growth of 2-D layers with precise thickness, defect densities. Leverage 2-D materials properties and their heterostructures by specifically designing nanoscale transistors and sensors.
Discussions/Comments
Proof of concept enough? Industry will do it if it is exciting! Need both exfoliation and CVD/MOCVD Nanoscale device properties are more important! Need several 10s of um in size – and devices should be reproducible Control of nucleation is a challenge in general for vdW solids Low-T processes such as ALD-based processes are needed Applications that do not need scalability – display, sensors, etc. 2-D materials by design Defects characterization and interface properties Applications unique to 2-D materials
Proposed Teams for Collaborations
1. Black Phosphorus Electronics
Team Members: Jim Hwang (Leigh) – Devices (RF)
Kaustav Banerjee (UCSB) – Devices and Circuits (Digital)
Won Kook Choi (KIST) – Synthesis and Devices
Young Hee Lee (SKKU) – Synthesis
2. Nucleation and Growth of 2-D Layers – Modeling and Experiments
– Physical and Chemical Interfaces, Epitaxy, Graphoepitaxy
Team Members: Lincoln Lauhon (Northwestern) – Synthesis, Materials Characterization
Suklyun Hong (Sejong) – Modeling
3. Strain Engineering of 2-D Crystals and Heterostructures
Team Members: Philip Feng (Case Western) – Devices, Systems
Young Hee Lee (SKKU) – Synthesis
Suklyun Hong (Sejong) – Theory and Modeling
4. 2-D SPASER (Surface Plasmon Amplification of Stimulated Emission of Radiation)
The goal of this research is to investigate optical gain in 2-D materials towards demonstrating a localized surface plasmon laser (SPASER). For instance, the higher density of states of bi-layer graphene could be utilized to provide amplification of localized sub-diffraction limited optical modes.
Team Members: Volker Sorger (GWU) – Devices
Tony Low (Minnesota) – Theory
C.J. Lee (Korea Univ) – Synthesis
5. CVD/ALD of Sn(S, Se)2 for 2-D Electronics and Photovoltaics
Team Members: Joan Redwing (PennState) – CVD and Materials Characterization
Hyeongtag Jeon (Hanyang Univ) – ALD
Zi-Kui Liu (PennState) – Theory
6. 2-D Materials Design (Materials Genome)
Team Members: Kaustav Banerjee (UCSB) – Devices
Suklyon Hong (Sejong) – Theory
Humberto Terrones (RPI) – Theory
Yu Huang (UCLA) – Synthesis
7. Theory and Experiments on Optoelectronics Properties of TMDCs
Team Members: Humberto Terrones (RPI) – Theory
Joan Redwing (PennState) – CVD
Suklyon Hong (Sejong) – Theory
8. Spectroscopy of Defects and Carrier Transport in 2-D Materials
Team Members: Lincoln Lauhon (Northwestern) – Synthesis, Materials Characterization
Humberto Terrones (RPI) – Theory
Seongil Im (Yonsei) – Devices and Defects Spectroscopy
Margaret Kim (Univ of Alabama) – THz Spectroscopy
Berardi Sensale-Rodriguez (Utah) – Spectroscopy and Devices
Jae Hoon Kim (Yonsei) – THz Spectroscopy
Sub-group 2: Nanotechnology Applications for Water
Strength in the US and Korea
Materials by design: catalytic and electrochemically active materials, functionalized graphene, carbon nanotubes and numerous other material systems. Modeling and material genome activities in US but not linked to water. Treatment processes utilizing nanotechnology: novel desalination processes, large scale reverse osmosis systems, low pressure membrane filtration systems, advanced oxidation. Novel applications related to water treatment: resource recovery and renewable energy sources (solar) Biosensors to detect water purity Multiple large centers, especially in Korea on this topic. However focus is on large-scale water not nanotechnology
Barriers in water applications or technical challenges
Scale and cost: municipal water supply and wastewater treatment systems are very large, require high throughput and extremely low cost: polymeric membranes cost ~$30/m2, water treatment cost ~ $0.1/m3. As a result, much of current research has no near term applications. Manufacturing infrastructure already in place for conventional membrane modules: new membrane materials need to use existing manufacturing infrastructure in order to be adopted by the industry Environmental Health Safety (EHS) issues are critical and often slow new technology entry due to needed safety testing. For decades there has been no major breakthrough in fundamental operational mechanisms for water production/treatment. The membrane technology is half a century old. Simply adding generic nanomaterials into a polymeric membrane will not lead to disruptive innovation. There is minimal US-Korea collaboration combining nanotechnology and water
Potential solutions
Connect material scientists with water/environmental engineers to developed tailored nanomaterials that can be easily incorporated into matrix materials and create synergy/novel functions, and compatible with industrial manufacturing processes. There needs to be workshops that bring the two communities together, perhaps jointly funded by NSF (CBET, DMR and CMMI, OISE) and their counterparts in Korea. Continuing effort in fundamental research on material development: e.g., corrosion and fouling resistant electrodes, photocatalysts, multi-functional membranes/ particles using low cost nanomaterials Scale-up nanocomposite membrane materials to reduce cost More research on process model aided reactor design that allows efficient utilization of nanotechnology in water treatment systems. Related is multi-scale modeling from nano-scale to process design. Building smart infrastructure: research towards incorporating smart algorithms and adaptive materials, interface with smart phones, etc. Develop roadmap with short term (5 year horizon) and long term (10 year and beyond. This incorporates technical goals and collaborative US-Korea research teams.
Opportunity for collaboration
There is significant overlap in research interest from both sides, primarily in: membranes, (photo/electro)-catalysis, desalination and pretreatment, carbon nanomaterials and surface chemistry, multiscale modeling. There are also large research centers on both sides that can be the anchor for wider collaboration.
Focused workshops at professional community conferences. For example: NAMS, MRS, IWA Nano&Water, ICOM. Establish partnership between centers on both sides to develop student/faculty exchange programs Webinar series to share research Seed funding for travel to develop modeling/experiment ties
Proposed Teams for Collaborations
Nanotechnology Enabled Water Treatment NEWT (Rice) can act as hub or Community of Researchers (CoR). Currently NEWT has strong Chinese ties to act as model/template Generally research in modeling and surface chemistry (US) coupled to large-scale water processing (Korea). For example: (US) Mamadou Diallo, Qilin Li, Bruce Hinds, Myung Jhon, (Korea) Joon Ha Kim, Soo Hong Noh, and Jong-Oh Kim
Suggested sub-topics:
1. Active or biomimetic membrane systems
2. Catalytically active membrane systems
3. Fouling resistant systems
4. Renewable energy sources for desalination
Specific questions:
1. What nano-enabled water applications are near maturity (near term applications)?
Nanocomposite membranes have been already commercialized (e.g., NanoH2O) and recently purchased for $200M. However, though economically viable, they provide incremental improvement over existing reverse osmosis membranes for desalination. Much of the ongoing research on nanotechnology for water treatment using common nanomaterials, e.g., carbon nanotubes, TiO2 nanoparticles, have had modest or minimal impact on performance.
For discussion purposes it is important to note that ultra-filtration and reverse osmosis are based on nano-scale control of material porosity and therefore should be classified as a nano-material. These systems currently have very large economic impact with water applications.
2. What are the main challenges facing the membrane based system for water purification?
For large scale applications, e.g., municipal water supply, the cost per unit volume of water treated must be very low to be competitive.
Relatively high level of operator skill for water pre-treatment needed to protect membrane systems from highly variable feed sources
Industry is risk adverse due to safety uncertainties
3. What other promising nanotechnologies (besides membranes) for water treatment?
Tailored nanomaterials that provide selectivity for contaminants (absorbates)
Catalytic nanomaterials with high selectivity
Biomimetic and enzymatic systems for water treatment
4. What long-term nanotechnology water applications do you envision?
Point of use systems with adaptive membranes coupled to smart phone algorithms to adapt to water source conditions.
Wider use of microfiltration related technology for challenged water (brackish) for agricultural use (food nexus) but automated and more robust
5. What do you see as the long term manufacturing and commercialization issues for these water applications?
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On behalf of the U.S participants
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On behalf of the Korean
participants
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Myung S. Jhon, Professor
Carnegie Mellon University
Pittsburgh, PA, USA
Ahmed Busnaina, Professor
Northeastern University
Boston, MA, USA
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Jo-Won Lee, Professor
Hanyang University
Seoul, Korea
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