(3ea) Synthesis and Kinetics of Advanced Ceramics and Intermetallics

Research Interests: Due to the ever-increasing technological demands in our society, there is a greater need for materials that have specifically tailored or targeted properties. These engineered materials are often more complicated than commonly used materials – they can be composites, heterostructures, or have advanced chemistries. Oftentimes, materials with extraordinary properties are discovered that rely on the interplay between multiple chemistries or by producing metastable phases.

There has been increasing attention on ceramics due to their desirable properties, however, the vast majority of the work has focused on oxides due to their ease of synthesis. This means that other ceramics, such as carbides, nitrides, and borides have been scarcely studied, even though they possess extraordinary properties, such as hardness, incompressibility, extreme melting points, wear resistance, and oxidation/corrosion resistance, or can be used as precursors for 2D materials.

My primary research interest relates to the synthesis, reaction mechanisms, and kinetics of advanced ceramic and intermetallic phases. By studying the relationship between the chemistry of these phases and their properties, it is possible to rationally target desired properties.

Postdoctoral Project: Synthesis-Structure-Property Relationship of Complex MAX Phases and MXenes

Under supervision of Yury Gogotsi, Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Drexel University

PhD Dissertation: Microstructure-Reactivity Relationship for Gasless High-Energy Density Materials

Under supervision of Alexander Mukasyan, Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, University of Notre Dame

Research Experience: During my PhD, I worked to understand how the structure of reactants affects their reaction kinetics. I proved that it is possible to have a combustion reaction occur solely in the solid state, with no phase transitions whatsoever. And that this can be done with materials that would traditionally melt. This solid-state combustion leads to a well-defined, controlled final product microstructure. I performed advanced structural characterization of ball-milled nanocomposites using focused ion beam sectioning and X-ray nanotomography, followed by reconstruction of the images to extract the surface area, diffusive distances, and other relevant structural parameters, then correlated these with their reaction parameters (activation energy, ignition temperature, combustion velocity, etc.). Throughout my PhD, I worked extensively with a computational group to build a model to accurately describe the combustion reactions that were occurring, covering chemical, thermal, and mechanical modeling.

After my PhD, I began working on M_n+1AX_n phase ceramics and 2D MXenes (M_n+1X_n). Because MXenes are produced from MAX phases, I initially worked to understand how the precursor MAX phase structure (defects, crystal size, etc.) carried over to the MXenes. From here, by combining multiple constitute M elements (Ti, V, Nb, Mo, etc.) I was able to produce unique structures that have never been observed before, expanding the definitions of both MAX phases and MXenes. Afterwards, I initiated a new field of study into solid-solution MXenes with controllable properties (optical, electrical, chemical, etc.). I have shown that it is possible to choose properties based on the initial chemistry of the MAX phase, and these properties can span multiple orders of magnitude and vary in a nonlinear fashion. Finally, I have been pioneering new methods to produce MXenes with enhanced properties (stability, electrical, morphological) by modifying the topochemical synthesis process itself.

Teaching Experience: I have extensive teaching experience both in the classroom and outside of it. During my PhD, I taught four courses: two in the classroom (thermodynamics and reaction engineering) and two laboratory classes. During my postdoctoral studies, I taught the introduction to materials science course (and was rated an overall 4.6/5.0 in my evaluations). In addition, I have mentored six undergraduate students. Each project that I personally developed (6-9 months in length) led to a publication for the undergraduate student, and awards for two of the projects. I also mentored a chemical engineering senior design team, which was chosen as the top team to represent the chemical engineering department in a school-wide competition. In addition, I have led many outreach programs focused on local high-school students, where I introduce them to science through experimentation and demonstration. Finally, I organized a Drexel-wide conference on MXenes to facilitate collaboration and discussion. This coming summer (August 2020), I will be leading a global course on MXene synthesis to teach the community the techniques and strategies that I developed to produce high-quality materials and less common MXenes.

Future Directions: As a faculty member, I will combine my experience in solid-state kinetics and synthesis to develop new ceramics and intermetallics with tailored properties. I will utilize both equilibrium and nonequilibrium synthesis approaches, combined with detailed kinetic analysis, to produce new materials and metastable phases. To modify and understand the reaction mechanisms, I will control precursor structure and morphology, thus tailoring the relative diffusion rates, and thus phase transformations. While it is important to produce individual materials, it is more important to understand how these materials are formed, and why they have their properties. By combining rational design of materials with kinetic insight, it will then be possible to further enhance and tailor the properties of interest. Therefore, I see myself forming close collaborations with computational groups to better understand these ceramics.

Selected Publications:

C. E. Shuck, A. Sarycheva, M. Anayee, A. Levitt, Y. Zhu, S. Uzun, V. Balitskiy, V. Zahrodna, O. Gogotsi, and Y. Gogotsi, “Scalable Synthesis of Ti₃C₂T_x MXene,” Advanced Engineering Materials, vol. 22, pp. 1901241, 2020.

G. Deysher, C. E. Shuck, N. Frey, A. Foucher, K. Maleski, A. Sarycheva, V. Shenoy, E. Stach, B. Anasori, and Y. Gogotsi, “Synthesis of Mo₄VAlC₄ MAX Phase and Two-Dimensional Mo₄VC₄ MXene with Five Atomic Layers of Transition Metals,” ACS Nano, vol. 14, pp. 204-217, 2020.

M. Han, C. E. Shuck, R. Rakhmanov, D. Parchment, B. Anasori, C. M. Koo, G. Friedman, and Y. Gogotsi, “Beyond Ti₃C₂T_x: MXenes for Electromagnetic Interference Shielding,” ACS Nano, vol. 14, pp.5008-5016, 2020.

C. E. Shuck, M. Han, K. Maleski, K. Hantanasirisakul, S. J. Kim, J. Choi, W. Reil, and Y. Gogotsi, "Effect of Ti₃AlC₂ MAX Phase on Structure and Properties of Resultant Ti₃C₂T_x MXene," ACS Applied Nano Materials, vol. 2, pp. 3368-3376, 2019.

C. E. Shuck and A. S. Mukasyan "Reactive Ni/Al Nanocomposites: Structural Characteristics and Activation Energy," The Journal of Physical Chemistry A, vol. 121, no. 6, pp. 1175–1181, 2017.

C. E. Shuck, J. M. Pauls, and A. S. Mukasyan "Ni/Al Energetic Nanocomposites and the Solid Flame Phenomenon," The Journal of Physical Chemistry C, vol. 120, no. 47, pp. 27066–27078, 2016.

C. E. Shuck, M. Frazee, A. Gillman, M. T. Beason, I. E. Gunduz, K. Matouš, R. Winarski, and A. S. Mukasyan "X-ray Nanotomography and Focused-Ion-Beam Sectioning for Quantitative Three-Dimensional Analysis of Nanocomposites," Journal of Synchrotron Radiation, vol. 23, no. 4 2016

C. E. Shuck, K. V Manukyan, S. Rouvimov, A. S. Rogachev, and A. S. Mukasyan, "Solid flame: Experimental Validation," Combustion and Flame, Combustion and Flame, vol. 163, pp. 487-493, 2016.