Corinne Arrouvel
Dr. Corinne has a PhD from the Université Pierre et Marie Curie (La Sorbonne) and IFPen,
France (2004), specialized in theoretical Physical Chemistry. In 2004-2009, she worked at
the University of Bath (UK) under the supervision of Stephen Parker, with whom she kept
collaborating. She moved to Brazil in 2009 as a postdoctoral officer at UFS and CBPF,
lecturer at UFSCar in 2013-2024 and today she is an associate professor in Inorganic
chemistry at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro. Along her carrier, her interests were
quite broad, multidisciplinar and linked to different topics, such as heterogeneous
catalysis, corrosion, biocompatibility, the origins of life, organic pollutants, energy materials
and green energy, using a combination of atomistic simulation techniques (classical and
quantum methods) to characterize the structural, electronic, magnetic and vibrational
properties in the solid state. Today, she is getting involved in geochemistry and mineralogy,
to prospect for natural hydrogen doing fieldwork. She has 27 publications and a H-index of
16. She has given more than 130 conference presentations and invited talks. She is leader
of the CNPq Research Group (Brazil): Computational modeling in exact and Earth
Sciences, leading projects on natural hydrogen with an ongoing support and collaboration
from ICMBio, GEO4U, CBPF, LENEP-UENF, Universidad del Atlántico-Colombia and
UNISTRAS.
Since the singular case study in Bourakebougou (Mali) by an accidental discovery of a hydrogen reservoir, geological hydrogen is today considered renewable and exploitable locally. An increasing interest for mapping reservoirs worldwide started chasing indices to localize accumulation of geological H2. Brazil has been one of promising countries with hydrogen structures on the soil surface, called Fairy circles or more recently denominated as circular depressions (in particular in Roraima, Minas Gerais, Ceará, Tocantins). Recent discoveries of major reservoirs have been found by chance (e.g. Lorraine-France, Bulqizë-Albania) manifesting other patterns, with a probable deeper formation and diffusion through faults. In the present investigation, the best regions for hydrogen prospection have been proposed considering some proxies accessible thought satellite images, topographic data (such as fairy circles, fractures/faults), magnetic and gamma anomalies and visual observation on-field. In São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro and Espírito Santo states of Brazil, we have detected high concentrations at less than 1 m of depth in the soil (>1% in volume of H2, detected using a semiconductor detector, Variotec). From those preliminary results, we couple mineral dataset with thermodynamic simulations to support the mechanisms involved during its formation. The highest values have been reported close to faults and fractures. Hypotheses about its accumulation are under investigation, requiring other techniques such as seismic studies. Acknowledgment: Arrouvel is grateful FAPESP 2022/12650-9 for financial support, ICMBio at the Ipanema National Forest and the biological reserve of Union in the state of Rio de Janeiro, Vanea Nogueira Oliveira for her technical support.
Co-authors : Leonardo Silva de Oliveira (LENEP-UENF) and Alain Prinzhofer (GEO4U)
UFRJ
Lecturer / Researcher
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