Journal: Journal of Fundamentals of Renewable Energy and Applications PDF
Published: 27-Aug-15 Volume: 5 Issue: 5
DOI: 10.4172/2090-4541.1000180 ISSN: 2090-4541
Authors: Mahendra Kumar Trivedi, Rama Mohan Tallapragada, Alice Branton, Dahryn Trivedi, Gopal Nayak, Rakesh K. Mishra and Snehasis Jana*
Citation: Trivedi MK, Tallapragada RM, Branton A, Trivedi D, Nayak G (2015) Physical, Spectroscopic and Thermal Characterization of Biofield treated Myristic acid. J Fundam Renewable Energy Appl 5:180. doi:10.4172/20904541.1000180
Myristic acid has been extensively used for fabrication of phase change materials for thermal energy storage applications. The objective of present research was to investigate the influence of biofield treatment on physical and thermal properties of myristic acid. The study was performed in two groups (control and treated). The control group remained as untreated, and biofield treatment was given to treated group. The control and treated myristic acid were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), Differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), Thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), Fourier transform infrared (FT-IR) spectroscopy, and Laser particle size analyzer. XRD results revealed alteration in intensity of peaks as well as significant increase in crystallite size (27.07%) of treated myristic acid with respect to control. DSC study showed increase in melting temperature of treated myristic acid as compared to control. Nevertheless, significant change (10.16%) in latent heat of fusion (?H) was observed in treated myristic acid with respect to control. TGA analysis of treated myristic acid showed less weight loss (31.33%) as compared to control sample (60.49%). This may be due to increase in thermal stability of treated myristic acid in comparison with control. FT-IR results showed increase in frequency of CH2 and C=O stretching vibrations, probably associated with enhanced bond strength and force constant of the respective bonds. The particle size analyzer showed significant decrease in average particle size (d50 and d99) of treated myristic acid with respect to control. Overall, the results showed significant alteration in physical, spectroscopic and thermal properties of myristic acid. The enhanced crystallite size, and thermal stability of treated myristic acid showed that treated myristic acid could be used as phase change material for thermal energy storage applications. .
The result showed significant impact of biofield treatment on physical, spectroscopic and thermal properties of myristic acid. XRD showed substantial increase in crystallite size of treated myristic acid with respect to control. DSC study on treated myristic acid showed increase in melting temperature with respect to control. A significant change in latent heat of fusion (10.16%) was observed in treated myristic acid as compared to control. TGA analysis revealed the lowering in weight loss of treated myristic acid as compared to control, which corroborated its high thermal stability. FT-IR spectroscopic study showed the alteration in force constant and bond strength of treated myristic acid with respect to control. Moreover, the biofield treated myristic acid showed decrease in particle size that may enhance the surface area as compared to control sample. Therefore, high melting temperature, thermal stability and appreciable latent heat of fusion of treated myristic acid may improve the phase change nature and it could be used for fabrication of thermal energy storage devices. Although, future studies such as thermal conductivity measurement can be further design to study the potential of biofield treated myristic acid for these applications.