(6bp) Bimetallic Catalysis for Various Shale Gas and Biomass Conversions

Teaching Interests: Chemical Reaction Engineering

To enhance sustainability and environment, it is increasingly attractive to develop alternative resources (e.g. shale gas, biomass) beyond petroleum for production of green fuels and value-added chemicals . Catalysis science and reaction engineering aspects, including catalyst design/synthesis, in-depth understanding of catalyst structure-function relations, reaction kinetics with potential transport phenomena and reactor configuration design, play an important role in these applications. In the present work, we report various bimetallic catalysts for conversion of biomass-derived compounds and shale gas components to alternative fuels and valuable chemicals. It demonstrates that, over these bimetallic catalysts, selectivity to target products may be tuned, and catalyst stability is typically improved. Based on experimental observations and theoretical analysis, structures of these bimetallic catalysts and their relations with catalytic performance are proposed. It is concluded that the primary metal and promoter typically show a cooperative effect, leading to tuning of selectivity and improvement of stability.