Phillip M. Hannam

Metal–Organic Frameworks with a Three-Dimensional Ordered Macroporous Structure: Dynamic Photonic Materials†

Tuning MOFs: When a metal-organic framework (MOF) with an ordered three-dimensional macroporous structure is integrated into a film, the resulting materials have an additional optical element, which can be used as a general and effective signal transducer. This, in combination with the hierarchical pore structure, makes these films interesting dynamic photonic materials with potential applications in sensors.

Electrospun fibrous mats as skeletons to produce free-standing MOF membranes

Nanofibrous mats produced by electrospinning are ideal porous substrates for developing chemical systems due to their high specific surface area, large porosity, and enormous structural and chemical tunability. In this work, we report the fabrication of free-standing MOF membranes using electrospun nanofibrous mats as skeletons, and demonstrate the great potential of such nonwoven fiber mats as a new type of porous support in MOF research field. Direct deposition and seeded secondary growth approaches could be used to produce MOF materials within different nanofibrous skeletons, indicating that the developed method of generating MOF membranes has a remarkable flexibility. The characterizations performed show that the resulting products combine the unique properties of both electrospun nanofibers and MOFs, and can be regarded as a new class of hierarchically nanostructured functional materials.

Electrospun fibrous mats as a skeleton for fabricating hierarchically structured materials as sorbents for Cu2

Based on the combination of the electrospinning and evaporation-induced self-assembly mesopore-forming technique, a facile strategy is developed to fabricate self-standing thiol-functionalized membranes with hierarchical structures (Macro-Mesopores and binding sites). This membrane is prepared using electrospun polystyrene (PS) fibers as the skeleton and non-ionic surfactant F127 as the structure-directing agent with co-condensation of tetraethyl orthosilicate (TEOS) and 3-mercaptopropyltrimethoxysilane (MPTMS). The prepared membranes were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), transmission electron microscope (TEM), scanning electron microscope (SEM), nitrogen sorption, mercury intrusion porosimetry, and Fourier transform infrared (FT-IR) spectra. The macropore constructed by the electrospun PS membrane ranged from 1 to 10 μm, while the highly ordered mesopore formed by F127 was around 5 nm and heavy metals binding cites of thiol groups were also presented, respectively. Using Cu2+ ions as the model bivalent cation, an excellent removal capacity of the prepared membrane was confirmed by the static sorption and dynamic filtration experiments with a high flux up to 1.30 × 104 L h−1 m−2bar−1. We find that regeneration of the membranes and the metal ion recovery can be facially realized by the treatment using acid solution. These results demonstrate that the developed strategy has significant potential for the design and fabrication of high-performance membranes with hierarchical structures and could find impactful application in the field of industrial catalysis, separation, and environmental pollution control and resources reuse.

The Mekong Game: Achieving an All-win Situation

In recent years, there have been many quarrels among countries of the Mekong River Basin surrounding use of the water resources of that river. In particular, China’s behavior of constructing dams upstream has resulted in objections by many people in all countries downstream. Cooperative game theory has been applied to solving issues of building and utilizing dams on trans-border rivers. The central question is how to allocate the surplus benefits generated by the dams. This paper proposes to achieve an all-win situation in use of Mekong water resources through cooperation. A game named “The Mekong Game” was designed for those Ph.D. students and resource persons to play on the PROSPER.NET’s workshop in 2010. For a hypothetical case in Mekong Game, the Shapley Value Method’s results were given, which could be regarded as one of equitable results in theory, and the Mekong Game’s process and outcomes are introduced in this paper. Participants were divided into six groups representing the six involved “countries.” The process of meeting an agreement with an all-win idea was simulated through three round-table negotiations. For the hypothetical case, different set of results under different situations were compared and discussed, including no dam(s), dam(s) without cooperation, dam(s) with cooperation but without compensation and re-allocation, Shapley Value Method, and Mekong Game (bargaining and negotiation). The results reveal: although it is hard to get theoretical optimal aftermath considering other complicated factors than those can be calculated, the all-win situation is still possible through bargaining and negotiation processes, which should be much better than all-lose situation such as the current one.

Integration of multi-technology on oil spill emergency preparedness.

This paper focuses on the integration of technologies including Case-Based Reasoning (CBR), Genetic Algorithm (GA) and Artificial Neural Network (ANN) for establishing emergency preparedness for oil spill accidents. In CBR, the Frame method is used to define case representation, and the HEOM (Heterogeneous Euclidean-Overlap Metric) is improved to define the similarity of case properties. In GA, we introduce an Improved Genetic Algorithm (IGA) that achieves case adaptation, in which technologies include the Multi-Parameter Cascade Code method, the Small Section method for generation of an initial population, the Multi-Factor Integrated Fitness Function, and Niche technology for genetic operations including selection, crossover, and mutation. In ANN, a modified back-propagation algorithm is employed to train the algorithm to quickly improve system preparedness. Through the analysis of 32 fabricated oil spill cases, an oil spill emergency preparedness system based on the integration of CBR, GA and ANN is introduced. In particular, the development of ANN is presented and analyzed. The paper also discusses the efficacy of our integration approach.

CBR respond and preparedness system development for environmental emergency

Effective response and preparedness plans are important for successfully coping with environmental emergencies. ‘Quickness’ and ‘accuracy’ are the most important requirements of environmental emergency response and preparedness planning. We propose the use of case-based reasoning (CBR) technology to develop response and preparedness plans using these principles. Taking into account the characteristics of a real environmental emergency, the development is presented using the example of a CBR – Oil Spill Response and Preparedness System. This paper introduces the methodology, which includes system architecture, inputs and outputs, case structure, case retrieval, case adaptation, case evaluation and retention, and management of the case base. The following methods are presented to meet the requirements of environmental emergency response and preparedness planning: the Frame method for defining case representation; the modified Heterogeneous Euclidean-Overlap Metric method for defining the similarity function; and the Attribute Hierarchical Model method for assigning relative weights to attributes. The effectiveness and uncertainty of the methodology are also discussed.

An all-win game for Mekong

There have been many quarrels among countries of the Mekong River Basin surrounding about use of the water resources of the river in recent years. This paper is to achieve an all-win situation in use of Mekong water resources through cooperation. A game named “The Mekong Game” was designed for those Ph.D. students and resource persons to play on the PROSPER.NETs workshop. For a hypothetical case in Mekong Game, the Shapley Value Methods results were given, which could be regarded as one of equitable results in theory, and the Mekong Games process and outcomes are introduced in this paper. Participants were divided into six groups representing six involved “countries”. The process of meeting an agreement with an all-win idea was simulated through three round-table negotiations. The results reveal: although it is harder to get theoretical optimal aftermath considering other complicated factors than those which can be calculated, the all-win situation is still possible through bargaining and negotiation processes, which should be much better than all-lose situation such as the current one.