Eunkyoung Shim

Confidential

Algal blooms in North Carolina occur annually due to eutrophication ������������������ excess of nutrients in surface water that causes dense growth of plant life. This is an environmental and public health concern, as the algae produced during bloom events both negatively impacts the aquatic life relying on water as the natural habitat and presents treatment challenges to utilities relying on surface water to provide safe-clean drinking water to their communities. Interventions to prevent eutrophication include reducing the amount of nutrients in receiving bodies of water (e.g. reducing the quantity of fertilizers on agricultural lands), planting adsorptive vegetation along streambeds of water bodies, and enforcing policies that regulate nutrient loading in the environment. Within this context, stormwater and its nutrient rich-microbially dense runoff, is a naturally occurring source of pollution; it exists as a pathway (point and non-point source) to introduce eutrophication-causing nutrients and microbial communities into receiving bodies of water. By reducing and/or eliminating the contaminants in stormwater runoff, receiving bodies of water are less likely to develop harmful algal blooms. The goal of the proposed study is to develop nonwoven based hybrid filters for microbe and nutrients capture in water, to absolve stormwater runoff as a contributor to eutrophication. A secondary goal of this project is to implement the developed nonwoven filter along creeks and streams in the Yadkin River Basin to determine the feasibility and efficacy of the design for stormwater runoff treatment.

The overarching goal of this project is to get preliminary data for a collaborative research project on stretchable electronics between two PIs (Dr. Gao and Dr. Shim) in the TECS department, and use the preliminary results to target external funding.

An ideal filter media should exhibit high filtration efficiency at low pressure drop and have long filter life (i.e. high dust holding capacity). Challenges in the filter media engineering is to achieve these three contradicting goals. Then, controlling and engineering various aspects of filter media structures poses critical importance to achieve high filtration performance. Therefore, understanding of 3D structure of filter media and changes in these structures during the filter use is essential to engineer ideal filter media. In this proposed research I aim to analyze 2D & 3D structures of filter media and evaluate their impacts on filtration properties. X-ray micro computed tomography (micro-CT) will be used to visualize inner structure of filter media and imaging analysis technique will be developed to quantify 3Dstructural characteristics of filter media. Then, the role of filter structures in filtration properties will be investigated. In particular, I am interested in the loading of the particle during the filter use and impacts of filter structures on filtration properties during the particle loading.

CONFIDENTIAL: The aim of this proposal is to investigate nonwoven technologies to address both near term and long-term developments of a new generation of high strength nonwoven fabrics as the base fabrics for use in applications of interest in the field of healthcare packaging.

The goal of this proposed research is to develop techniques to evaluate the degree of entanglement/dispersion of short-cut fibers dispersed in the aqueous media. More specifically, we purpose to develop image analysis technique to qualitatively and quantitatively evaluate fiber dispersion and entanglement in the aqueous media. This will include establishing a protocol of sample collections, optimization of image capture conditions and development of proper image analysis algorithms as schematically shown in Figure 1. We plan to create a set of fiber/media dispersions with different degree of dispersion and entanglement by adjusting fiber length/diameter ratio, fiber concentration and dispersion time to use as a reference set. The purpose of this is to check effectiveness and applicability of technique to be developed through procedure. Fiber samples will be collected from this reference set and dispersion defect will be visualized (Task 1). The result of task 1 would be used to qualitatively evaluate the degree of fiber entanglement. In next step, we pursue to develop image analysis technique to provide further information and more quantitative analysis. Two different methodology would be used – separation/detection of fiber bundles (Task 2) and application of uniformity analysis (Task 3). In the end of the project period, fiber/particle mixture may be introduced to see feasibility of fiber/particle dispersion analysis using the proposed the scheme.

The objective of this proposed study is ?h To review current charging technology for aerosol filtration applications. ?h To develop a die-head for meltblown process to make an electrical charged web.