Green, David L.
Primary Appointment
Associate Professor, Chemical Engineering
Contact Information
Telephone: 4-1302
Email: dlg9s@virginia.edu
Research Interests
Reaction engineering of nanoparticles. Rheology of complex nanoparticle suspensions.
Research Description
Our research group focuses on the synthesis of well-defined nanoparticles, their dispersion into polymer solutions and melts, and their suspension rheology.
First, we study the mechanisms that produce well-defined nanoparticles and then use this knowledge to optimize for a range of industrially relevant properties such as particle stability, surface expression, or catalytic activity. We are also interested in developing timely methods for determining nanoparticle growth rates inside of emulsions which are used in formulating a variety of commercial products like fiber-optic coatings, automotive finishes, and chromatographic packings.
Second, we examine how grafting uniform polymers to the interfaces of well-defined nanoparticles affects their rheological behavior in polymer solutions and melts. With our fundamental studies, we seek to optimize processing to achieve a desirable microstructure in industrial suspensions, and to set a foundation for developing constitutive rheological models that predict the complex behavior of industrial suspensions. To this end, we use rheological and rheo-optical measurements to elucidate how the interactions within model suspensions affect their flow at nano-, micro-, and macroscopic length scales the full range of interactions that effect the processing of engineered materials.