Put your asphaltene source on a silica gel column and elute with hexane and then hexane/toluene mixture to remove paraffins (saturated compounds), aromatics, and resins (small polar compounds). At last, remove the asphaltenes (high molecular weight polar compounds) with pure toluene, evaporate to dryness (a brittle black solid), then with heat you can disolve/disperse the asphaltenes in a simple high molecular weight neutral material like petroleum jelly and let it cool. This will give a high and/or adjustable concentration of what you want to look at. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asphaltene
Put your asphaltene source on a silica gel column and elute with hexane and then hexane/toluene mixture to remove paraffins (saturated compounds), aromatics, and resins (small polar compounds). At last, remove the asphaltenes (high molecular weight polar compounds) with pure toluene, evaporate to dryness (a brittle black solid), then with heat you can disolve/disperse the asphaltenes in a simple high molecular weight neutral material like petroleum jelly and let it cool. This will give a high and/or adjustable concentration of what you want to look at. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asphaltene
Hi James, we had indeed arrived to the same conclusion, we are going to try candle wax this afternoon. Yes, some self-aggregation maybe unavoidable, indeed, Im not exactly sure if I would know. But Im excited about the idea of getting an EPR "powder" spectrum of the crude. It might tell me a lot. Mostly likely it will just confuse me though :-)More
In that case, you could add a wax, heat to dissolve, mix well, then cool. Waxes come in a wide range of melting points from petroleum jelly to paraffins (up to 60C mp) and microcrystalline waxes (up to 90C mp). Your comment suggests that some self-aggregation may be a natural condition.More
Thanks for the feedback James. I worry that the spectrum of the asphaltene would change quite a bit if it was taken through that the extraction process. Indeed, there are papers which describe how that process creates spectra that depend on the solvent polarities used to create the standalone asphaltene. So my hope is to leave it somehow "unmolested" in the oil and then monitor the change in spectrum as the tumbling rate is frozen, and in such a way that I neither trigger self-aggragation nor destruction.More
Put your asphaltene source on a silica gel column and elute with hexane and then hexane/toluene mixture to remove paraffins (saturated compounds), aromatics, and resins (small polar compounds). At last, remove the asphaltenes (high molecular weight polar compounds) with pure toluene, evaporate to dryness (a brittle black solid), then with heat you can disolve/disperse the asphaltenes in a simple high molecular weight neutral material like petroleum jelly and let it cool. This will give a high and/or adjustable concentration of what you want to look at. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asphaltene
Put your asphaltene source on a silica gel column and elute with hexane and then hexane/toluene mixture to remove paraffins (saturated compounds), aromatics, and resins (small polar compounds). At last, remove the asphaltenes (high molecular weight polar compounds) with pure toluene, evaporate to dryness (a brittle black solid), then with heat you can disolve/disperse the asphaltenes in a simple high molecular weight neutral material like petroleum jelly and let it cool. This will give a high and/or adjustable concentration of what you want to look at. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asphaltene
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