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- Pratikshya Sharma
Graduate Student
Kansas State University, Department of Chemistry, Chikan’s Lab
Pratikshya's research area is synthesis of colloidal nanoparticles and quantum dots. Currently, she is working on the synthesis of iron and manganese nanoparticles with different sizes in a short time period via industrially reliable scaleup inductive heating technology. Thus, synthesized nanoparticles can potentially be used in affordable fossil-free ammonia synthesis by step catalysis at atmospheric pressure and temperature. The motivation for her research comes from the shortcomings lying on the traditional method of ammonia synthesis. The traditional method ammonia synthesis requires high temperature, high pressure and heterogeneous catalysis which requires high capital costs and limits application in emerging markets. However, the iron and manganese nanoparticles synthesized at her lab can use nitrogen and hydrogen gas (renewable resources) to make ammonia through step catalysis. This is much cost effective as it is carried out at atmospheric temperature and pressure. Furthermore, this method can be used in scale-up synthesis in future. Ammonia synthesis will enable high-yield sustainable crop production for growing world population, preserving planet and making best use of land and water.
The rotating magnetic field in an inductive heater generates alternating current which provides rapid temperature rise per second to produce highly monodisperse nanoparticles.