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  4. Burcu Gurkan

Burcu Gurkan

Professor
Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering
Case School of Engineering

Teaching Information

Teaching Interests

Electrochemical Energy Storage, Thermodynamics, Reaction Engineering

Research Information

Research Interests

Our research program is built on developing experimental approaches to understand the physical, electrochemical and transport properties of ionic liquids and deep eutectic solvents, and applying these fundamentals to electrochemical processes, separations, and sensors. Our work has three research pillars: 

  1. Solvation and transport in complex fluids;
  2. Electrode-electrolyte interfaces;
  3. Material synthesis and fabrication.

Solvation and Transport in Complex Fluids: Ionic liquids, deep eutectic solvents and similarly concentrated electrolytes present new capabilities and opportunities in electrochemical energy storage such as access to wide range of soluble charge carriers at high concentrations, improved electrochemical stability and storage capacity, reduced flammability and volatility. In such complex electrolytes, the ion solvation structure and transport mechanism differ from ideal electrolytes which are dilute and often binary. We aim to develop an understanding of these different mechanisms and specifically investigate how the partial solvation of a solute ion by different counter ions and ligand exchanges impact the solvation structure and ion transport in complex fluids.

Electrode-electrolyte Interfaces: We are developing approaches that simultaneously apply electroanalytical techniques, surface enhanced spectroscopy and reflectivity techniques to probe the interfacial structure of complex electrolytes that are pertinent to energy storage devices, advanced sensors, and electrocatalytic processes.

Our work in the area of solvation, transport and interfaces specific to deep eutectic solvents is part of a greater effort by BEES (Breakthrough Electrolytes for Energy Storage) – an Energy Frontier Research Center.

Materials Synthesis and Fabrication: While this research pillar supports many of the projects, our main effort is the development of engineered materials for separations, conversions and sensors. Our unique contribution in the field of CO2 separations addresses the low absorption capacity of existing materials for direct air capture, inadequate gas-liquid surface area and leaching of liquid from its support upon variable pressures and in microgravity. Specifically, we are developing functional and highly selective solvents, and incorporating into polymeric architectures for applications in absorption, adsorption, membrane separations, and potentially adaptable for capture and conversion processes. One aspect of this work is the encapsulation of selective solvents in collaboration with Prof. Emily Pentzer. As we develop highly selective solvents and materials with the understanding of structure-property relations, we combine these with the highly sensitive metamaterials and photonic nanostructures to develop miniaturized chemical sensors with our collaborators: Profs. Michael Hinczewski, Guiseppe Strangi and Umut Gurkan. 

Publications

See Google Scholar page for the most current and complete list of publications.

2023

  • Zeeshan, M., Kidder, M., Pentzer, E., Getman, R., & Gurkan, B. (2023). Direct Air Capture of CO2: From Insights into the Current and Emerging Approaches to Future Opportunities. Frontiers in Sustainability, 4 (1167713).
  • Dongare, S., Coskun, O., Cagli, E., Lee, K., Rao, G., Britt, D., Berben, L., & Gurkan, B. (2023). A bifunctional ionic liquid for capture and electrochemical conversion of CO2 to CO over silver. ACS Catalysis, 13 (12), 7812 - 7821.
  • Lee, Y., Cagli, E., Klemm, A., Park, Y., Wickramasinghe, N., Dikki, R., Kidder, M., & Gurkan, B. (2023). Microwave regeneration and thermal and oxidative stability of imidazolium cyanopyrrolide ionic liquid for direct air capture of carbon dioxide. ChemSusChem, e202300118
  • Klemm, A., Vichhio, S., Bhattacharjee, S., Cagli, E., Park, Y., Zeeshan, M., Dikki, R., Liu, H., Kidder, M., Getman, R., & Gurkan, B. (2023). Impact of hydrogen bonding on CO2 binding to choline amino acids in ethylene glycol: An experimental and computational study towards sorbent design for direct air capture. ACS Sustainable Chemistry & Engineering, 11 (9), 3740 - 3749.

2022

  • Ghahremani, R., Dean, W., Sinclair, N., Shen, X., Starvaggi, N., Alfurayi, I., Burda, C., Pentzer, E., Wainright, J., Savinell, R., & Gurkan, B. (2022). A redox-active eutectic solvent with viologen and ferrocene derivatives for redox flow batteries. ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces, 15 (1), 1148 - 1156.
  • Lee, Y., Wickramasinghe, N., Dikki, R., Jan, D., & Gurkan, B. (2022). Facilitated Transport Membrane with Functionalized Ionic Liquid Carriers for CO2/N2, CO2/O2, and CO2/Air Separations. Nanoscale, 14 (35), 12638 - 12650.
  • Dean, W., Penley, D., Lee, Y., Ghahremani, R., Dongare, S., & Gurkan, B. (2022). Anion effects on the interfacial structure and bulk physical properties in choline-based hydrogen-bonded electrolytes. Journal of Physical Chemistry C, 126 (34), 14598 - 14610.
  • Zhang, Y., Klein, J., Akolkar, R. N., Gurkan, B. N., & Maginn, E. N. (2022). Solvation Structure, Dynamics and Charge Transfer Kinetics of Cu2+ and Cu+ in Choline Chloride Ethylene Glycol Electrolytes. The Journal of Physical Chemistry C, 126 (34), 6493 - 6499.
  • Penley, D., Wang, X., Lee, Y., Garaga, M., Ghahremani, R., Greenbaum, S., Maginn, E., & Gurkan, B. (2022). Lithium solvation and mobility in ionic liquid electrolytes with asymmetric sulfonyl-cyano anion. Journal of Chemical & Engineering Data, 67 (8), 1810 - 1823.
  • Shaheen, N., Dean, W., Penley, D., Kersten, B., Rintamaki, J., Vukmirovic, M., Gurkan, B., & Akolkar, R. N. (2022). Electro–oxidation of nitroxide radicals: Adsorption–mediated charge transfer probed using SERS and potentiometry. Journal of Electrochemical Society, 169 (5).
  • Klein, J., Wang, H., Sacci, R., Browning, J., & Gurkan, B. (2022). Smooth modified surfaces of silicon for the study of ionic liquid interfaces by neutron reflectometry. ACS Applied Electronic Materials, 4 (5), 2217-2226.
  • Ghahremani, R., Savinell, R., & Gurkan, B. (2022). Hydrogen Bonded Concentrated Electrolytes for Redox Flow Batteries: Limitations and Prospects. Journal of Electrochemical Society, 169 (3).
  • Spittle, S., Poe, D., Doherty, B., Kolodziej, C., Heroux, L., Haque, M., Squire, H., Cosby, T., Zhang, Y., Fraenza, C., Bhattacharyya, S., Tyagi, M., Peng, J., Elgammal, R., Zawodzinski, T., Tuckerman, M., Greenbaum, S., Gurkan, B., Burda, C., Dadmun, M., Maginn, E., & Sangoro, J. (2022). Evolution of Microscopic Heterogeneity and Dynamics Choline Chloride-Based Deep Eutectic Solvents. Nature Communications, 13 (219).
  • Zhang, Y., Squire, H., Gurkan, B., & Maginn, E. (2022). Refined Classical Force Field for Choline Chloride and Ethylene Glycol Mixtures over Wide Composition Range. Journal of Chemical Engineering Data, 67 (8), 1864-1871.

2021

  • Lee, Y., & Gurkan, B. (2021). Graphene oxide reinforced facilitated transport membrane with poly (ionic liquid) and ionic liquid carriers for CO2/N2 separation. Journal of Membrane Science, 638
  • Gurkan, B., Sun, X., Klemm, A., Kim, Y., Sharada, S., Rodriguez-Katakura, A., & Kron, K. (2021). Perspective and Challenges in Electrochemical Approaches for Reactive CO2 Separations. iScience, 24 (12).
  • Penley, D., Vicchio, S., Getman, R., & Gurkan, B. (2021). Energetics of Li+ Coordination with Asymmetric Anions in Ionic Liquids by Density Functional Theory. Frontiers in Energy Research, 9 (570).
  • Gaur, S., Edgehouse, K., Klemm, A., Wei, P., Gurkan, B., & Pentzer, E. (2021). Capsules with polyurea shells and ionic liquid cores for CO2 capture. Journal of Polymer Science.
  • Alfurayi, I., Fraenza, C., Zhang, Y., Pandian, R., Spittle, S., Hansen, B., Dean, W., Gurkan, B., Savinell, R., Greenbaum, S., Maginn, E., Sangoro, J., & Burda, C. (2021). Solvation Dynamics of Wet Ethaline: Water is the Magic Component. The Journal of Physical Chemistry B, 125 (31), 8888-8901.
  • Dean, W., Klein, J., & Gurkan, B. (2021). Do deep eutectic solvents behave like concentrated electrolytes? A perspective from the electrode-electrolyte interface. Journal of Electrochemical Society, 168 (2).
  • Lee, Y., Penley, D., Dean, W., Klemm, A., & Gurkan, B. (2021). Deep eutectic solvent formed by imidazolium cyanopyrrolide and ethylene glycol for reactive CO2 separations. ACS Sustainable Chemistry & Engineering, 9 (3), 1090-1098.


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