[CCoE Notice] UH ChBE SABIC Seminar this Friday April 5

Tue Apr 2 10:53:14 CDT 2019

UH ChBE SABIC Seminar this Friday April 5

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[Catalysts Live & Up Close]

[Professor Bert M. Weckhuysen Distinguished Professor  Utrecht University  Friday, April 5, 2019, 10:30 am Room 100D, Cemo Hall]

[The search for new or more effective solid catalysts would benefit when we could bridge the molecular world with the macroscopic world. Such detailed information can be realized if we would have access to a very powerful camera shooting molecular movies of an active catalytic solid at the level of single atoms and molecules. This is the field of operando spectroscopy. Recent breakthroughs in chemical imaging techniques, based on optical, electron and X-ray methods, demonstrate that such molecular movie concept is within reach.  This lecture discusses the recent advances in spectroscopy and microscopy of catalytic solids at different length scales, starting from single molecules and single atoms up to the level of individual catalyst particles. Special emphasis will be devoted to the exploration of mesoscale effects as well as on the scientific challenges ahead to make such molecular movie reality. Examples include Methanol-to-Hydrocarbon catalysis, Fischer-Tropsch Synthesis, Fluid Catalytic Cracking and the Sabatier reaction. It will be shown how this better understanding of catalytic processes may be beneficial for transforming our society to a more sustainable one. The critical concept of such much needed transition towards a circular economy should be: reduce, reuse & recycle.     Bert Weckhuysen is a Distinguished University Professor at Utrecht University (the Netherlands). He received his Masters Degree in Chemical & Agricultural Engineering from Leuven University (Belgium) in 1991. After obtaining his PhD degree from Leuven University in 1995 under the supervision of Prof. Schoonheydt, he worked as a postdoc with Prof. Wachs at Lehigh University (USA) and with Prof. Lunsford at Texas A&M University (USA). He was appointed Full Professor of Inorganic Chemistry and Catalysis at Utrecht University in 2000. Weckhuysen designs, characterizes and applies catalysts for the conversion of fossil (crude oil & natural gas) and renewable (biomass & waste) feedstock into fuels and chemicals. More recently, research is devoted to the catalytic activation of CO2 and the splitting of water into hydrogen and oxygen. The goal is to shed insight in the working principles of catalytic solids while they really work and to achieve this he strives to build a "powerful camera" to chemically image heterogeneous catalysts from the level of the reactor down to the level of single atoms and molecules.]

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