Week 10: Wrapping Up
Taara S -
Hello and welcome back to my second to last blog post. Thank you to everyone who has kept up with my project these past two months!
This week, I wrapped up my experiments and continued working on my final products and presentation.
On Thursday, my professor installed two removable o-rings above the desiccant funnel. I re-ran the blue silica gel experiment, and the o-rings greatly helped with the powder loss. Although some powder got stuck to the o-rings themselves, it was minimal and the crevices below the desiccant funnel had less powder buildup due to the o-rings sealing the edges.
On Friday, I ran the activated alumina experiment, which again created minimal powder loss but the final weight was only 10.72 g, still low comparatively.
On Monday, I ran powdered zeolite again since when I had run it several weeks ago, the powder I was using was manually crushed by me using the mortar and pestle. So, I re-ran the experiment with the zeolite powder my professor purchased, since the particle size of the powder is known and is the same size as the other three desiccants. The capacity of zeolite was about twice as large as the other powdered desiccants.
With all my data collected, I finished graphing comparisons of the adsorption behavior, adsorption capacities, and adsorption rate constants and kinetic curves.
I’m currently adding my completed powder experiments to my paper and poster and final touches to my PowerPoint presentation. I have my first rehearsal this Friday and have been practicing presenting my research in a cohesive story.
After my last experiment, my professor and I discussed how to proceed with desorption, the next phase of atmospheric water capture. Even though I won’t have time before my final presentation to perform the next set of experiments, beginning with the desorption of silica gel, I am excited to hopefully continue working with my professor over the summer and keep going in this realm of research.
Stay tuned for next week’s conclusion post and thanks for reading!
Comments:
All viewpoints are welcome but profane, threatening, disrespectful, or harassing comments will not be tolerated and are subject to moderation up to, and including, full deletion.