(569y) Scalable Manufacturing of Inorganic Nanoparticles Using a High Temperature Jet Mixing Reactor

Typical laboratory batch reactors for inorganic nanoparticles (NPs) synthesis can be difficult to scale since rapid particle nucleation and growth require efficient mixing to produce monodisperse particle size distribution (PSD). As the size of the reactor increases, it becomes increasingly difficult to achieve uniform temperature and concentration, leading to variations in the size, shape, and composition of the NPs. These factors limit their use in commercial applications ranging from electronics to catalysis. Continuous microreactor-based synthesis is an attractive alternative, providing a uniform PSD with mixing times of a few milliseconds. This work explores a novel JMR design consisting of an axial flow with two jets impinging on the mainline, resulting in a single stream that exits the reactor. Our lab has successfully studied the scalable synthesis of metal NPs and core@shell NPs in JMR at room temperature. One promising type of core@shell NPs is Pd@TiO₂ which exhibited high catalytic selectivity for biomass upgrading. These particles were synthesized in JMR using pre-formed palladium(Pd) in a batch process. Pd requires a high temperature for its formation and the JMR has not been investigated at high temperatures previously resulting in a barrier for a fully continuous synthesis of these particles. However, keeping in mind the direction of economic feasibility, copper (Cu) was used as a model system to study the behavior of the high-temperature reactor as it is cheaper than Pd. Preliminary results showed Cu NPs synthesized in JMR have a better uniform PSD than a batch process. Cu NPs will be further tested for electrocatalysis as it has been identified as an excellent system for converting carbon dioxide into various value-added renewable resources. Future work involves yield study of these particles to expand on the scalable manufacturing methods of these nanocatalysts and develop a continuous system for the synthesis of Pd@TiO₂ nanocatalysts.