Euroclay2015 - Materials

Bentonites: linking clay science with technology

steve.hillier — Thu, 11 Dec 2014 21:44:17 +0000

Bentonites are very important industrial clays, which are valued by the industry due to the unique properties of smectites. This symposium invites presentations which deal with all aspects of bentonites, from the geological, mineralogical and geochemical characteristics of deposits, to the determination of physical properties, possible processing/activation routes and commercial applications. Of particular importance are the characterization of bentonite deposits consisting of dioctahedral or trioctahedral smectites, the description of mineralogical and chemical heterogeneity within bentonites, and the determination of key smectite properties, which control both conventional and novel industrial and environmental applications.

Themes:

Materials

Convenors:

George E. Christidis, Technical University of Crete, Greece

Stephan Kaufhold, BGR, Hannover, Germany

Don Eisenhour, Mineral Technologies Inc. Illinois, USA

Industry perspectives in clay and fine-particle science

steve.hillier — Thu, 11 Dec 2014 21:38:16 +0000

A wide-ranging session to include contributions in areas such as mineral deposits, characterisation for applications, processing of minerals, mining and bio-mining, beneficiation, remediation, applications in materials, composites, coatings, catalysis, environmental protection and agriculture, as well as legal and regulatory issues that face industry.

Themes:

Materials

Convenors:

Jon Phipps Imerys Minerals Limited, Cornwall, UK

Prakash Malla Thiele Kaolin Company, Georgia USA

Ian Wilson Consultant, Cornwall, UK

Developments and applications of quantitative analysis to clay-bearing materials, incorporating ‘The Reynolds Cup School’

steve.hillier — Thu, 11 Dec 2014 21:31:13 +0000

Because of their effects on the physical and chemical properties of rocks, soils, clays, and industrial materials, and because of the genesis and history information they record, knowledge of the types and relative amounts of clay minerals and other poorly ordered minerals is essential in many academic and industrial endeavours. Methods of quantitative phase analysis (QPA) represent, therefore, important tools e.g. in mineral exploration and processing, in clay science, and material science to name a few. This session invites contributions on QPA by any available method such as diffraction, spectroscopy, chemical analysis, or microscopy or combination of methods and approaches. Papers on methods and procedures as well as applications of QPA procedures, in soil, geological and materials science are encouraged. The session will conclude with ‘The Reynolds Cup School’, a series of invited presentations and extended discussion outlining best practice in procedures and strategies to obtain QPA of ‘state of the art’ quality with today’s most widely available tools and to discuss ways to address the many challenges that still remain.

Themes:

Materials

Convenors:

Michael Ploetze ClayLab Zurich, Switzerland

Reinhard Kleeberg TU Bergakademie Freiberg, German

Mark Raven CSIRO, Urrbrae, Australia

Helen Pendlowski The James Hutton Institute, Aberdeen, Scotland

Asian Clay Minerals Group Research in Progress (II) (part of Euroclay2015)

steve.hillier — Thu, 11 Dec 2014 21:05:25 +0000

The Asian Clay Research Group was organized through the Nagoya and Seoul meeting in 2010 and 2012. We plan to hold the 3rd meeting in Guangzhou in 2016. Our first participation in The CMS meeting in College Station, Texas, USA (2014) was successful in terms of communicating/collaborating with other clay minerals groups. The purpose of this session, held as part of the Euroclay2015 meeting, is to bring active Asian clay scientists together and promote scientific communication and interaction with the international clay minerals community. We invite papers on, but not limited to, biotic and abiotic reactions in natural environments that impact a number of geological and environmental process, such as sediment diagenesis, colloid transport, and the mobility and the ultimate fate of organic and inorganic contaminants. Topics also include the science and technologies of industrial clays, including exploration and clay resource development, particle engineering from macro to nano, and chemical and physical modification.

Themes:

Energy

Environment and Health

Materials

Convenors:

Jinwook Kim Yonsei University, Seoul, Korea

Jae-Min Oh Yonsei Unviersity, Wonju, Korea

Hyen-Goo Cho Gyeongsang National University, JinJu, Korea

Clay and fine particle-based materials for environmental technologies and clean up

steve.hillier — Thu, 11 Dec 2014 20:52:00 +0000

Environmental pollution is a growing public concern worldwide as society industrialises and citizens become more aware of the associated risks. Despite many resources being channelled towards the development of technologies for cleaning up contaminated environments, millions of contaminated sites still exist in sensitive locations because of the prohibitive cost of remediation or the lack of an effective technology to clean up sites to a level required by regulators. As a result, much scientific effort is being directed at developing new technologies which are both efficient and inexpensive. Natural materials such as clay minerals, which are inexpensive, highly adsorptive and available ubiquitously in all continents, hold great potential as environmental materials, both with and without modification. This symposium will highlight recent research advances in clay minerals-based remediation and remediation technologies including modified and non-modified clay minerals, redox active clay minerals, layered double hydroxides, bacteria supported clay minerals, and other novel fine particle based materials.

This session is supported by CRCCARE

Themes:

Environment and Health

Materials

Convenors:

Binoy Sarkar, University of South Australia, and CRC CARE, Australia

Ravi Naidu, CRC CARE, Australia

Anke Neumann, University of Newcastle, UK

Beyond smectite-based nanocomposites

steve.hillier — Thu, 11 Dec 2014 20:39:52 +0000

Nowadays, investigation on polymer-clay nanocomposites is already a well-established area of research that attracts scientists from both basic and applied research fields. For many years, smectites were the chosen clay for the preparation of those nanocomposites but now other types of clays minerals, such as kaolinite, nanotubular halloysite or microfibrous sepiolite and palygorskite are increasingly used in the preparation of polymer-clay nanocomposites. Additionally, polymers of natural origin are more and more employed in the development of the so-called bionanocomposites or green nanocomposites. In this way, the use of special clays and/or biopolymers make possible the incorporation of new properties and functionalities in the resulting nanocomposites. This session intends to be a forum for the latest research on nanocomposites focusing on innovative advances related to materials based not only on smectites but also on other types of clay minerals from kaolinite to fibrous clays, as well as related materials (e.g., layered double hydroxides), involving both synthetic and natural polymers.

Themes:

Materials

Convenors:

Pilar Aranda Instituto de Ciencia de Materiales, CSIC, Spain

Christian Detellier University of Ottawa, Canada

Structural characterization of lamellar compounds

steve.hillier — Thu, 11 Dec 2014 12:50:50 +0000

Over the last decade or so, structural characterization of layered compounds has benefited from the intrinsic evolution of the commonly used techniques (TEM, XAS, XRD, etc), and especially from improvements in quantitative methods of data analysis. In particular, the collation of experimental and computational results allowed reciprocal improvements of both approaches. Significant progress has come also from the combination of experimental approaches allowing for a thorough characterization of complex and/or very defective lamellar structures, including natural materials and mixed-layered materials. This session will be devoted to the recent advances of individual techniques, and to new possibilities offered by their combination. New structural interpretations, dynamical properties, and insights into the formation and evolution of such materials in natural environments are also relevant. Materials of interest include, but are not limited to, phyllosilicates, layered oxides, layer double hydroxides, and layered compounds in general.

Themes:

Materials

Convenors:

Douglas McCarty Chevron ETC, Houston, USA

Eric Ferrage Université de Poitiers, France

Vanessa Prevot Université Blaise Pascal, France

Vicente Rives Universidad de Salamanca, Spain

The many faces of chlorite

steve.hillier — Thu, 11 Dec 2014 12:40:44 +0000

This session focuses on the many geological occurrences of chlorite: from soils to detrital sediments, to sedimentary and diagenetic systems, to hydrothermal alterations and to low- and medium-grade metamorphic rocks, chlorite is everywhere. It forms as pure grains, or as interlayers with phyllosilicates such as smectite, serpentine, and vermiculite. The aim of this session is to bring together those with an interest in chlorite in any of its many forms, to present data from a wide variety of different analytical techniques, and to promote awareness of the complexity of chlorite and above all the potential for it to provide new and useful information on many geologic processes from the surface of the earth to deep in the crust.

Themes:

Energy

Environment and Health

Materials

Convenors:

Jeff Walker Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, New York, USA

Daniel Beaufort Université de Poitiers, France

Atsuyuki Inoue Chiba University, Japan

Computational chemistry studies of clay minerals - bridging length and time-scales

steve.hillier — Thu, 11 Dec 2014 12:19:53 +0000

As analytical methods such as atomic force and scanning electron microscopy increasingly provide nanoscale information about processes occurring in layered minerals, the atomic resolution of computer simulation methods has become a natural adjunct to understand processes and structure at clay surfaces. Electronic structure simulations provide insight into redox processes, chemical reactivity at surfaces, and allow comparison with spectroscopic methods. Molecular mechanics approaches, where electrons are not included, are allowing the study of increasingly large systems and longer timescales. As well as structural properties, phenomena such as adsorption, ion effects and thermodynamic properties are increasingly extracted from such simulations. In recent years, these methods have been coupled together, along with coarse-grained molecular dynamics (where groups of atoms are coalesced) and phenomena such as intercalation or exfoliation may be studied. This session will provide an up-to-date overview of computer simulations applied to layered mineral science.

Themes:

Materials

Convenors:

Chris Greenwell Durham University, UK

Richard Anderson Hartree Centre, STFC, UK

Randy Cygan Sandia National Laboratories, New Mexico, USA

Natural zeolites – environmental, biomedical and industrial applications

steve.hillier — Thu, 11 Dec 2014 10:52:53 +0000

Natural zeolites are microporous hydrated aluminosilicate minerals having countless technological applications due to their unique physicochemical features such as cation exchange, selective adsorption, molecular sieving, catalysis, etc. As far as cation exchange is concerned, natural zeolites have been largely investigated for ammonia and heavy-metal removal, although modification of these minerals with long-chain cationic surfactants enhances their adsorption properties towards anions and low polar organic contaminants. In addition, they have also recently been considered as carriers of pharmaceutical-active ingredients. This session is designed to promote discussions on these topics but also on other interesting technological applications including water and wastewater treatment, soil remediation, treatment of radioactive waste, as well as application in the veterinarian, pharmaceutical and industrial sectors.

Themes:

Energy

Environment and Health

Materials

Convenors:

Aleksandra Dakovic ITNMS, Physico-Chemical Laboratory, Belgrade, Serbia

Allessio Langella Sannio University, Italy

Linda Campbell The University of Manchester, UK