As my Rice internship is coming to an end, I am getting closer to finishing up research project. I have read, experimented, and collected almost all of the data needed for my poster presentation, with one or two more experiments before I can call it quits. Though I am looking forward to designing my poster as well.

This week was pretty productive. I did pretty much most of my lab work by myself and my mentor trusted me to conduct tests on solar cells by myself. From watching her setup the solar cell configuration, test the resistance, and connect the alligator clips, and start measuring dark and light measurements under the solar simulator, I thought it was difficult. However, she encouraged me to do it by myself, and next thing you know, I am doing it by myself which was cool. The purpose of the solar cells tests is to figure out which contact on the solar cell has the highest efficiency when it captures light. That solar cell will then be combined with the electrocatalyst Iridium Oxide, which will be responsible for driving the chemical reaction in the electrolyzer.

 

As of writing this blog, I am on my last two steps of my synthesis of Iridium Oxide, the electrocatalyst I will add to the electrolyzer. All I need to do is just heat it to 350 degrees for an hour and

then calcinate it at 550 degrees for another hour. After this, I will analyze its catalytic activity with a method called LSV (Linear Sweep Voltammetry) which will read the current vs the potential of

the IrOx when we load it into a piece of Nickel foam. The electrocatalyst was very tough to break, and this is when I realized not all research is exhilarating as I thought it was. I spent about an hour and a half trying to break this electrocatalyst carefully and trying to

conserve most of it. After this, I was on the last step, which was to calcinate it to about 550 degrees Celsius, and then wash it with deionized water to remove any soluble salts.

 

 

After the steps above, I will spray coat the IrOx on a piece of Nickel foam, where I will conduct a series of electrochemical tests to observe the catalytic behavior of my synthesized IrOx. One of the things I did enjoy was to be able to conduct these procedures by myself, and I was able to do it successfully. I actually felt pretty confident in doing these procedures, all thanks to my mentor.

 

Now for the next two weeks, I will dedicate more time for my poster presentation, as well as the finalization of my research. Stay tuned for next week!

 

 

-Adrian