| Abstract Scope |
Porous materials and matrices (thin or thick) are important components for many functional devices (e.g. filters, combustors, and electrodes), in which porosity and pore size/distribution are crucial to the ultimate performance of the devices. For example, the performance of fuel cells and batteries is strongly influenced by percentage, size and distribution of pores as they determine the number of reactive sites for charge transfer. However, there exists an optimal porosity for the best performance with a balanced gas diffusion and charge transfer kinetics. Graded porous structure is an ideal platform to achieve the balance between gas diffusion and charge transfer. Here in this presentation, we present our effort to optimize the phase inversion (PI) process for achieving desirable microstructures for specific applications. We show performances of these porosity-graded microstructures in fuel cells and CO2 capture membranes. |