[CCoE Notice] Zoom Webinar: REMOVAL OF BACTERIA AND VIRUSES BY MEMBRANES CONTAINING SINGLE-WALLED CARBON NANOTUBE-POLYMER NANOCOMPOSITES * Online * 10:30 am, Friday, April 17, 2020 * Debora F. Rodrigues * University of Houston *

[Knudsen, Rachel W]

***** Seminar *****
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Materials Engineering Program
Center for Integrated Bio and Nano Systems
  10:30 a.m., April 17, 2020
Join Zoom Meeting
https://zoom.us/j/845619943?pwd=QlZvYUV6M2dxNDkvNWxBd3F2YzdJZz09

Meeting ID: 845 619 943
Password: 016104

REMOVAL OF BACTERIA AND VIRUSES BY  MEMBRANES CONTAINING SINGLE-WALLED CARBON NANOTUBE-POLYMER NANOCOMPOSITES
Debora F. Rodrigues
Department of Civil and Environmental engineering
The University of Houston
Abstract:. Nanotechnology has the potential to create new materials and devices with wide-ranging applications in medicine, electronics, and energy production. Carbon-based nanomaterials, such as single-walled carbon nanotubes, graphene, and graphene oxide,  have unique antimicrobial, physical, chemical, electrical, optical and mechanical properties that  make them very valuable materials for materials science, high-energy physics, and a wide range of technological applications, such as biosensing, solar cells, and bioelectronics. Besides the pure form of carbon-based nanomaterials, there has also been high interest in utilizing  these carbon-based nanomaterials with industrial polymer and resin coatings for barrier protection, thin films for biosensors and biomedical devices, semiconductor packaging, anti-corrosion coatings, hospital equipment, and food packaging.
This interest arises as a result of the improved antimicrobial performance and new added properties of the nanomaterial in the nanocomposite form as compared to their individual constituents, such as lower life-cycle cost, design flexibility, and applicability for large-scale fabrication. My research group has been successfully incorporating carbon-based nanomaterials (e.g. graphene, graphene oxide, and single-walled carbon nanotubes) in the polymer polyvinyl-N-carbazole (PVK) to develop advanced functional materials for different environmental engineering applications, including bacterial and viruses removal. The PVK polymer was selected to generate carbon-based nanocomposites since it has exceptional electronic and mechanical properties, anti-corrosion capability, ease of processibility, and thin film fabrication via electrochemical methods. Furthermore, PVK can be readily used as a nanomaterial dispersant, since PVK forms a  stacking interaction with carbon based nanomaterials through the carbazole group, which stabilizes the dispersion of the nanomaterials in any solution chemistry and creates a conducting polymer network (CPN). The unique property of the PVK polymer combined with the antimicrobial property of carbon-based nanomaterials was explored by my research group to modify membranes to effectively inactivate and remove virus and bacteria from water.

[cid:image003.png at 01D6118A.375AE0B0]Short Bio: Debora F. Rodrigues is currently an Associate Professor at the University of Houston in the department of Civil and Environmental engineering with a joint appointment with the Materials Science & Engineering. Dr. Rodrigues received her BS and MS in Biology & Microbiology, from the University of Sao Paulo, Brazil, and her PhD in Microbiology and Molecular Genetics at Michigan State University. She was a postdoctoral associate in the Environmental Engineering Program at Yale University from 2007 to 2010. Dr. Rodrigues has authored more than 70 peer-reviewed journal articles in the field of environmental microbiology, microbial ecology and environmental engineering with more than 4300 citations. She has received funds from diverse federal agencies (Department of Interior, NIFA-USDA, NSF, NASA, DOE) pertaining to water quality and sustainability, including the NSF Career award. She has combined the knowledge and skills obtained in her Ph.D. study at Michigan State University on microbiology & molecular genetics and three years of postdoctoral research at Yale University in the Chemical Engineering Department to better understand and protect water ecosystems, and also to develop sustainable filtration methods to improve water quality.
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