I am Feryantama, PhD student within the SEED MSCA COFUND program on the Nantes campus, a former Master-level student from IMT Atlantique.
Who are you and what is your background?
I am a master's graduate in Engineering Physics's major at Universitas Gadjah Mada, Indonesia. I also studied Nuclear Engineering for my bachelor's degree at Universitas Gadjah Mada, Indonesia. I have also completed part of my master's in Nuclear Engineering at IMT-Atlantique for a year before finishing it in Indonesia for the second year, as a part of the FICEM ERASMUS+ double degree program. Previously, I accomplished my internship with the Indonesian National Nuclear Agency (BATAN) by performing a neutron irradiation experiment. Although I have a lot of experience in experiments, I am also very interested in employing adequate computational methods to improve the result of the experiment or vice versa. Currently, I am very interested in computational physics and chemistry, either on the fundamental particle or molecular scale. Therefore, I would like to learn more about the real application of the computational method and how it can be integrated into industry practice.
What is your PhD research/ topic about?
I am studying the atomistic simulation of CO2 adsorption in the MgO surface for carbon sequestration application. The study will be implemented by using both computational and experimental to explore the carbonation process of the MgO molecular layer. It can be useful to deduct the CO2 adsorption limit in MgO according to specified temperature, pressure and humidity. My goal is to explain the carbonation process and MgO transformation into amorphous carbonate through the formalized Molecular Dynamic force-field parameters. In order to achieve it, we utilized the classical Molecular Dynamic and Quantum Molecular Dynamic as computational methods while also using the MgO adsorption experiment result as a comparison. We will also explore the possibility of employing machine learning to accelerate the simulation.
What are the big challenges to be tackled and possible future impacts?
The Geological Carbon Capture and Sequestration (CCS) technology is shown to have big potential to be implemented in many industries, especially in the mining industry. This research will answer the problem of atmospheric carbon capture using readily available minerals in many mining industries. Although oxides mineral such as MgO is already known to be reactive with CO2, the mechanism of the reaction is not very much explained. Moreover, the limitations of CO2 adsorption and MgO degradation need to be explored in order to set a better operational limit for CCS implementation. Through a better understanding of the reaction mechanism, the reaction could be enhanced to perform better adsorption in human timescale while also retaining its integrity during carbon storage. With the help of both experiments and computation methods, we could gain a highly accurate explanation of the adsorption up to the molecular level. Furthermore, this research could be continuously applied to various similar research related to the carbonation process.
What is the configuration of your PhD research?
My research is in a Co-supervision track where the supervisor team consists of personnel from IMT-Atlantique, France and Umea University, Sweden. I have been integrated into the Molecular Geochemistry team at Umea University while also being in the Radiochemistry team at IMT-Atlantique. Recently, I met my supervisor from Sweden and our colleague on a similar research topic to conduct the briefing for our research. In the mid of my study, I will perform my research in Umea, Sweden for 12 months and also visit the mining industry that works closely with my research team.
After a few weeks embarked as PhD fellow at IMT Atlantique, what is your first feeling about the programme and your institution?
It is been an honour to come back to Nantes as a PhD fellow in IMT Atlantique. I have received a good reception from the team and the other thesards. I could start my research very early since I already got my computational resources during my first week. There are many research activities that are offered by my laboratory team, doctoral school, and also the international community related to my topic. It is great to be near to many opportunities to support my desire to do research.
