Featured Student Research

Dennis Nguyen

Graduate Student in the Fry-Petit Research Group

Identifying the relationship between catalytic properties and structural changes for Oxygen Transport Materials 

Research Snapshot

My research involves understanding the structural changes that occur within Oxygen Transport Materials (OTMs) during industrial conditions and how it relates to the OTMs catalytic properties. This is to overall be able to discover ways to fine-tune an OTM to specific industrial needs, such as for Chemical Looping Reactions (CLR) which the OTM can accommodate structural changes versus Solid Oxide Fuel Cells (SOFCs) cells that prefer an OTM with structural stability. 

Research Goals

One of the main goals of my research is to assess structural changes and partial methane oxidation performance of the OTM family La_0.9Sr_0.1Co_1-yFe_yO_3-δ under industrial conditions via neutron and synchrotron diffraction, as well as gas board data collection. I'm also studying how adding ceramic oxides like cerium oxide to La_0.9Sr_0.1Co_1-yFe_yO_3-δ, affects its structural changes and ability to partially oxidize methane

About Me

Hi, my name is Dennis Nguyen, and I was born and raised in Anaheim, CA and still currently reside there. I got my bachelor of science degree in chemistry from California State University, Fullerton in 2021. I am currently interested in learning new analytical techniques and instruments, all while learning how it’s like to work in a research lab. My plans for the future is to work in the industry either as an analytical scientist, R&D scientist, or a QC scientist. Something that I like to do in my spare time is playing video games and an interesting fact about me is that I actually played on the collegiate league of legends team, and we placed 5th out of the 70 teams in the west conference.