Lundi 16 Décembre, 14h00, Amphithéatre Pierre-Gilles de Gennes, Bâtiment Condorcet, niveau -1, 10 rue Alice Domon et Léonie Duquet, 75013 Paris.
Soutenance de Enrique Manso
Développement et étude approfondie de nanocomposites à base de carbon dots pour des applications environnementales
Thèse dirigée par Alain Ponton (MSC, DOMM, CNRS, Université Paris Cité).
Résumé :
Cette thèse propose une étude approfondie du développement de nanocomposites à base de carbon dots (CD), en allant de la synthèse et la purification de CD, la préparation de nanocomposites à base de CD et l’étude de leurs propriétés structurelles, optiques et thermomécaniques couplée à une analyse statistique utilisant une nouvelle approche dans ce domaine, les modèles additifs généralisés avec des équations non paramétriques, jusqu’à leur évaluation pour des applications dans les sciences de l’environnement.
Development and comprehensive study of carbon dot-based nanocomposites for environmental applications
Abstract: This PhD research proposes a deeper understanding of the development of carbon dot-based nanocomposites, beginning from the synthesis and purification of carbon dots (CD), the preparation of CD-based nanocomposites and followed by the study of their structural, optical and thermo-mechanical properties coupled with a statistical analysis using a novel approach in this field, namely generalized additive models, with regard to their applications in environmental science.
In a first step we synthesised CD from glucose using a one-step ultrasonic method in basic media. After synthesis, two different purification methods were evaluated: dialysis and precipitation of the residual salts and glucose by changing the continuous phase from water to ethanol. The optical, mechanical, thermal and electrical properties of CD dispersions obtained by both purification methods were studied demonstrating that purification by dialysis is the most efficient method. The more accurate study of the structure, morphology and chemical functionalisation of dialysed CD led to the conclusion that the glucose-based CD could present an amorphous graphitic/graphitic oxide heterogeneous multilayered structure with variable interlayer distances depending on the oxidation degree.
In a second step, the elaboration of optically responsive CD-based nanocomposites was optimised using two biopolymer hydrogels of different natures in order to assess the effect of polymer matrix on the final properties of CD-based nanocomposites. The first polymer under investigation was alginate (a negatively charged polysaccharide) which was physically crosslinked through the introduction of calcium cations. The second selected polymer was chitosan (a positively charged polysaccharide) chemically crosslinked by a Schiff base reaction between the amine groups of chitosan and the aldehyde groups of glyoxal, a short-chain dialdehyde. The impact of CD concentration on the modulation of the sol-gel transition kinetics, thermo-mechanical, optical and structural properties of fully gelled samples of both types of composites was studied. The incorporation of CD within the polymeric matrix was found to exert a significant influence on the properties of chitosan composites due to the electrostatic interactions between the negatively charged CD and the positively charged chitosan amine groups, leading to a faster kinetics of the sol-gel transition and enhanced mechanical properties of the composites. In contrast, the impact of CD on alginate composites was observed to be minimal. This can be explained by the different interactions present in these composites. Hydrogen bonding between the oxygen-rich functional groups of CD and the functional groups of alginate results in a faster sol-gel transition. Alternatively, electrostatic interactions between the negatively charged CD and Ca2+ cations slightly weaken the crosslinking interaction, which consequently affects the mechanical properties.
Finally, the detection and adsorption of metallic ions were investigated from an application-based standpoint, taking advantage of the adjustable fluorescence emission of CD. The effective detection of different metallic ions was demonstrated by a discernible quenching of CD dispersions fluorescent emission as a function of excitation wavelength, temperature, pH and CD concentration. Additionally, preliminary results were also obtained on the detection of nickel ions by CD-based chitosan nanocomposites. Furthermore, a novel investigation of the time-dependent adsorption of metallic ions by immersion of dried alginate hydrogels using laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) allowed to obtain interesting results on homogeneous three-dimensional adsorption of ions and simultaneous detection of multiple ions without sample pretreatment opening up promising prospective avenues for further research.