Resources

PAL Research Group has access to state-of-the-art facilities (bench- and pilot- scale) to conduct cutting edge research in sustainable and functional bioproducts to deliver top-class hygiene, smart packaging, and flexible electronics/3D materials and products that benefit society as well as the environment.

About

• Extremely diverse team of engineers, chemists, scientists and economists
• Highly trained professional faculty, staff, graduate research assistants (Ph.D. and M.S. Students), and undergraduate researchers
• Strong funding support from industry, NGO’s and public agencies

A short list of relevant equipment located in the faculty laboratories is provided below:

• High shear mechanical devices for nanomaterials production
• Two atmospheric plasma units
• Mocon-OX-TRAN-Oxygen-Transmission-Rate-Tester
• Mocon-PERMATRAN-WVTR-Tester
• Electrospinning unit
• 3D material deposition printers
• Image analysis (microscopic and scanner)
• 3D scanning system
• QD proofer coating with gravure and flexo coating and printing heads
   
• Euclid blade coater
• Rod drawdown system
• Roll-to-roll coating machine with roll applicator and air-knife metering
• Hot air, IR and UV curing units
• Hercules Hi-Shear viscometer (HHSV)
• Brookfield viscometer
• Advanced rheometer
• Melt-flow indexer
• Injection mold
• Mini-Haake Micro-Compounder
• fully-equipped mechanical, optical and surface properties lab
• KRÜSS spinning drop tensiometer
• Contact angle goniometer
• Charge demand analyzer
• Horiba laser scattering particle sizer
• Malvern zetasizer nano
• Confocal and polarized microscopes
• X-Supereme 8000 ED-XRF spectrometer
• Coating mixers and various applicators
• Aging/yellowing via controlled irradiation, and various environmental chambers, etc.
• In addition, advanced analytical tools such as DSC, TGA, FTIR, NMR, AFM, SEM, ToF-SIM, HPLC, GC/MS, etc. accessible in various central laboratories on NCSU campus.

The paper, coating and recyclability testing and development is supported by the department’s pilot plant facilities. Our pilot facilities include a wide range of pulping, bleaching, papermaking, and separation technologies from chipping to the finished sheet. Our pilot plant includes a Fourdrinier paper machine, which has a 12-inch deckle width and a speed of up to 150 feet per minute. The machine is equipped with a wet-end shake, size press and calender stack. The pilot machine is used for research, as well as for training and contract trials.

Recently added equipment: