Wirtschaftsingenieurwesen und Management

Evaluation of Thermal and Physical Properties of Magnesium Nitride Powder: Impact of Biofield Energy Treatment

Abstract

Mahendra Kumar Trivedi, Rama Mohan Tallapragada, Alice Branton, Dahryn Trivedi, Gopal Nayak, Omprakash Latiyal and Snehasis Jana

Magnesium nitride (Mg3N2) has gained extensive attention due to its catalytic and optoelectronic properties. The present investigation was aimed to evaluate the effect of biofield energy treatment on physical and thermal properties of Mg3N2 powder. The Mg3N2 powder was divided into two parts i.e. control and treated. The control part was remained as untreated and the treated part was subjected to the Mr. Trivedi’s biofield energy treatment. Subsequently, the control and treated Mg3N2 samples were characterized using differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), and X-ray diffraction (XRD). The DSC results showed the specific heat capacity of 2.24 Jg-1°C-1 in control, which increased upto 5.55 Jg-1°C-1 in treated Mg3N2 sample. The TGA data revealed that the onset temperature for the formation of magnesium oxide, possibly due to oxidation of Mg3N2 in the presence of air and moisture, was reduced from 421.0°C (control) to 391.33°C in treated sample. Besides, the XRD data revealed that the lattice parameter and unit cell volume of treated Mg3N2 samples were increased by 0.20 and 0.61% respectively, as compared to the control. The shifting of all peaks toward lower Bragg angle was observed in treated sample as compared to the control. The XRD diffractogram also showed that the relative intensities of all peaks were altered in treated sample as compared to control. In addition, the density of treated Mg3N2 was reduced by 0.60% as compared to control. Furthermore, the crystallite size was significantly increased from 108.05 nm (control) to 144.04 nm in treated sample as compared to the control. Altogether data suggest that biofield energy treatment has substantially altered the physical and thermal properties of Mg3N2 powder. Thus, the biofield treatment could be applied to modulate the catalytic and optoelectronic properties of Mg3N2 for chemical and semiconductor industries.