Jones Group

Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at Georgia Tech

Anthony Vallace

Office: ES&T 3370
Email: avallace3@gatech.edu

Favorite vacation spot? Long Beach Island, NJ
Favorite food or food genre? Anything Italian!!!

Educational Background

Ph.D. Chemical Engineering 2021 Villanova University

M.S. Chemical Engineering 2018 Villanova University

B.S. Chemical Engineering 2016 Villanova University

Advisors

Chris Jones and Ryan Lively

Project

  1. Synthesis, Modification Characterization, and Adsorption Properties of Al-Rich Chabazites for Gas Separation Applications
  2. Lithium ceramics and supported metal oxides for sorption enhanced water gas shift applications

Project Descriptions

  1. My primary graduate research was proprietary work for the Adsorption Technology Group at Air Products and Chemicals. I developed various synthetic routes for zeolitic adsorbents for various gas purification applications. I studied the effect of precursor pre-treatments on the transformation of X and Y-type Zeolite to chabazite. I also developed different gel synthesis, exploring how low-cost precursors can be used to synthesize chabazite directly. In addition, I studied how the chabazite composition affects the adsorption properties for different gas separation applications. The final portion of the zeolite project, which I am currently working on, involves post-synthetic modifications of different chabazite compositions that would make “game changing” improvements to commercial gas separations.
  2. I was heavily involved in projects that aim to synthesize high temperature adsorbents for sorption enhanced water gas shift (SEWGS) applications. This involved two major approaches: fabrication of supported metal oxide sorbents using traditional approaches and atomic layer deposition (ALD) and direct synthesis of nano-scale sorbents using templated approaches.
  3. Modeling work: I developed a novel kinetic model that monitors the SEWGS sorbent performance over the course of the carbonation reaction, allowing for the proper characterization of materials, unavailable from previous kinetic models. I also have experience with process modeling of pilot scale adsorption columns. This involved operating a pilot scale adsorption column and intensifying the process using Air Products’ internal process model

Publications

  • Vallace et al. Kinetic Model for CO2 Capture by Lithium Silicates, DOI: 10.1021/acs.jpcc.0c04230
  • Vallace et al. Surfactant Mediated Lithium Orthosilicate Composite Enables Rapid High-Temperature CO2 Absorption, DOI: 10.1021/acs.iecr.1c00177
  •  Vallace et al. A Study of Structural Defects in X- and Y-Type Zeolites and their Effect on its Transformation to Al-rich CHA, DOI: 10.1021/acs.jpcc.1c01475
  •  Vallace et al. Improved Gel Synthesis Enables Routes to Al-rich Chabazite, DOI: 10.1016/j.micromeso.2020.110755