Graduation Year

2023

Document Type

Thesis

Degree

M.S.

Degree Name

Master of Science (M.S.)

Degree Granting Department

Civil and Environmental Engineering

Major Professor

Christopher L. Alexander, Ph.D.

Committee Member

Arash Takshi, Ph.D.

Committee Member

Katherine Alfredo, Ph.D.

Keywords

Bipolar Electrochemistry, Butler-Volmer Equation, Finite Element Method, Localized Corrosion, PDE-Constrained Optimization

Abstract

Bipolar electrochemistry (BPE) is a technique that provides a wireless alternative totraditional electrochemistry to elicit redox reactions. It has been utilized in different applications, including studying localized corrosion, gradient electrodeposition, propulsion of micromotors, and water treatment. The popularity of the method is not solely dependent on its wirelessness but more due to the simultaneous presence of cathodic and anodic poles on the same surface, which also begets its name as bipolar. The concept of the method is based on the polarization of conductive objects in an electric field in the presence of an electrolyte. In BPE, instead of controlling the potential of the working electrode through a direct electrical connection, the interfacial potential difference between the floating potential of the working electrode and the potential drop inside the electrolyte creates a continuum of potentials on the surface of the bipolar electrode (BE). Notwithstanding the numerous benefits, the method also has its drawbacks. A primary disadvantage of the technique is inability to accurately measure the current flow and potential of the bipolar electrode; since the bipolar electrode is polarized without any direct electrical connections and only indirect techniques can be used to estimate the current/potential of the BE. Although BPE has been extensively studied with disparate configurations and in various applications, there is no justification for the selection of appropriate geometry in the literature and the geometries used in previous works are arbitrarily chosen. In addition, the influence of geometrical parameters of the cell on the current/potential distributions in the bipolar electrode remains recondite. The uniformity of the current distribution is important when BPE is used to investigate pitting corrosion. If pits are grown under the nonuniform current distribution, then the pit growth kinetics analysis is unreliable. The aim of this study is to elucidate the impact of cell elements on the uniformity of current in a split, open BPE configuration, find an optimized geometry contributing to the most even current distribution, and increase the bipolar current efficiency for studying a bipolar electrode undergoing localized corrosion.

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