Synthesis of Novel Materials

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Background: Catalysts, electrocatalysts, supports, supercapacitors, etc. are all functional materials that can be synthesized from liquid precursors. These materials generally relate to carbon, nitrogen, and oxygen based materials where the preparation method used can either be a mechanochemical synthesis process or the sacrificial supports method, or a combination of both. Liquid precursors are typically used because liquid has some basic advantages over other precursor types; such as storage, logistics, and manufacturability; however, historically, liquid precursors have the drawback of being toxic, volatile, flammable, or even explosive. These drawbacks have made synthesizing functional materials from these liquid precursors dangerous and sometimes impractical. There exists a present market need for a process to synthesize functional materials that is not derived from dangerous liquid precursors.    Technology Description: University of New Mexico researchers have developed a unique method to synthesize novel functional materials from ionic liquids (IL). This breakthrough method has all of the advantages of using current liquid precursors without any of the drawbacks (toxicity, flammability, etc.). This new method can use either commercially available ionic liquids or the ionic liquids that are synthesized at the functional material processing location. Another advantage of using the ionic liquid precursor method is that it allows for the synthesis of materials that have properties that can only be achieved through ionic liquid precursor synthesis.   Advantages: Ionic liquids possess all positive advantages of liquids without drawbacks Not toxic, flammable, volatile, or explosive like typical liquid precursors Capable of achieving material properties only found in Ionic liquid precursor synthesized materials Possess high activity in both alkaline and acid media Preparation method is based on using either mechanochemical synthesis, sacrificial supports method, or combination of both methods Effective catalysts for oxygen reduction Applications include: catalysts/electrocatalysts, supports, supercapacitors/ultracapacitors, etc.