Open Collections

UBC Faculty Research and Publications

Automated Primary Particle Sizing of Nanoparticle Aggregates by TEM Image Analysis Dastanpour, Ramin; Boone, Jocelyne M.; Rogak, Steven

Abstract

Nanoparticle aggregates formed in colloidal or aerosol processes have complex morphologies. Soot, for example, is formed as aggregates of primary particles. Soot properties are influenced by the diameter (๐‘‘p) and the arrangement of its constitutive primary particles. Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM) is commonly used for the characterization of agglomeratesโ€™ morphology, but manual analysis of the micrographs is extremely labour-intensive. Here, a new method is developed for automatic determination of the average primary particles diameter based on the variation of the 2-D pair correlation function P(๐‘Ÿ) at distances ๐‘Ÿ measured from the main skeleton of the aggregates. It is assumed that Pโˆ— = P(๐‘‘p/2) is nearly constant. The method has been applied to numerical agglomerates and real soot aggregates collected from several operating conditions of a gasoline direct injection engine and a heavy-duty compressionignition engine. Using a constant value for Pโˆ— determined from the analysis of TEM images results in primary particle sizing errors (relative to manual sizing) of ~13% for single aggregates. The ensemble-mean values of ๐‘‘p for manual and automatic sizing differed by ~4%.

Item Metadata

Title
Automated Primary Particle Sizing of Nanoparticle Aggregates by TEM Image Analysis
Creator
Dastanpour, Ramin; Boone, Jocelyne M.; Rogak, Steven
Date Issued
2016-07
Description
Nanoparticle aggregates formed in colloidal or aerosol processes have complex morphologies. Soot, for example, is formed as aggregates of primary particles. Soot properties are influenced by the diameter (๐‘‘p) and the arrangement of its constitutive primary particles. Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM) is commonly used for the characterization of agglomeratesโ€™ morphology, but manual analysis of the micrographs is extremely labour-intensive. Here, a new method is developed for automatic determination of the average primary particles diameter based on the variation of the 2-D pair correlation function P(๐‘Ÿ) at distances ๐‘Ÿ measured from the main skeleton of the aggregates. It is assumed that Pโˆ— = P(๐‘‘p/2) is nearly constant. The method has been applied to numerical agglomerates and real soot aggregates collected from several operating conditions of a gasoline direct injection engine and a heavy-duty compressionignition engine. Using a constant value for Pโˆ— determined from the analysis of TEM images results in primary particle sizing errors (relative to manual sizing) of ~13% for single aggregates. The ensemble-mean values of ๐‘‘p for manual and automatic sizing differed by ~4%.
Genre
Article; Postprint
Type
Text
Language
eng
Date Available
2018-07-01
Provider
Vancouver : University of British Columbia Library
Rights
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
DOI
10.14288/1.0314549
URI
http://hdl.handle.net/2429/59255
Affiliation
Applied Science, Faculty of; Mechanical Engineering, Department of
Citation
Dastanpour R, Boone JM, Rogak SN. Automated primary particle sizing of nanoparticle aggregates by TEM image analysis. Powder Technology. 2016;295:218-224.
Publisher DOI
10.1016/j.powtec.2016.03.027
Peer Review Status
Reviewed
Scholarly Level
Faculty; Graduate; Undergraduate
Rights URI
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Aggregated Source Repository
DSpace

Item Media

Item Citations and Data

Rights

Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International