EES Catalysis Blog

Realising the Double Benefit of Selective Ethane Activation

Descriptor-based identification of bimetallic-derived catalysts for selective activation of ethane with CO2

Haoyue Guo, Zhenhua Xie, Xuelong Wang, Jingguang G. Chen and Ping Liu

EES. Catal., 2023,1, 17-25 DOI D2EY00051B

An interview with the authors

What aspect of your work are you most excited about at the moment and what do you find most challenging about your research?

For simultaneously upgrading CO2 and C2 light alkanes into different types of important industrial feedstocks, it is important to control the selective scission of C-H/C-C bonds in alkanes. It is challenging due to the structural complexity of catalysts. By using combined approaches of in situ characterization and DFT calculations, our research can lead to the discovery of active sites for effective catalysts for CO2-assisted alkane activation.

How do you feel about EES Catalysis as a place to publish research on this topic?

As a new EES journal with a focus on catalysis, EES Catalysis is an ideal journal to share cutting edge research for catalysis related to energy and environment.

Novel Catalyst for Efficient Hydrogen Production from Formic Acid

Boosting the activity of PdAg alloy nanoparticles during H2 production from formic acid induced by CrOx as an inorganic interface modifier

Kohsuke Mori, Tatsuya Fujita and Hiromi Yamashita

EES. Catal., 2023,1, 84-93 DOI D2EY00049K

Meet the authors

Kohsuke Mori received his PhD degree from the Graduate School of Engineering Science at Osaka University in 2003. In 2004, he joined at University of California, Berkeley, as a postdoctoral fellow. He moved to the current faculty in 2005 and then became an associate professor in 2009. His current research interests focus on metal and alloy nanoparticle catalysts to establish clean and environmentally-friendly carbon-neural processes, hybrid photocatalysts based on visible-light-responsible MOF, and the fabrication of catalytic reactor by 3D printing technique.

Tatsuya Fujita received his bachelor’s degree from the School of Engineering at Osaka University in 2022. He is now a first grade of master course student in Graduate School of Engineering at Osaka University. His research topic is the development of highly efficient heterogeneous catalysts for the use of formic acid as a promising hydrogen energy carrier.

Hiromi Yamashita has been a professor at Osaka University since 2004. He received a PhD degree from Kyoto University in 1987. He was an assistant professor at Tohoku University and an associate professor at Osaka Prefecture University. He was also a visiting research fellow at the California Institute of Technology. He is now the president of Catalysis Society of Japan (2019–2020) and the president of Asia-Pacific Association of Catalysis Societies (2019–2022). His research interests include the design of single-site photocatalysts and nanostructured catalysts.

An interview with the authors

What aspect of your work are you most excited about at the moment and what do you find most challenging about your research?

The most exciting thing is to discover something unexpected but really new, and the most difficult thing is to observe the actual catalytic reaction and imagine what is true.

How do you feel about EES Catalysis as a place to publish research on this topic?

We believe EES Catalysis will provide a powerful platform for presenting cutting-edge research in this fascinating area.

Can you share one piece of career-related advice or wisdom with other, early career scientists?

To do what you want and trust your intuition no matter what.

A Promising Strategy for the Synthesis of Energy Efficient Syngas

Direct carbonate electrolysis into pure syngas

Yurou Celine Xiao, Christine M. Gabardo, Shijie Liu, Geonhui Lee, Yong Zhao, Colin P. O’Brien, Rui Kai Miao, Yi Xu, Jonathan P. Edwards, Mengyang Fan, Jianan Erick Huang, Jun Li, Panagiotis Papangelakis, Tartela Alkayyali, Armin Sedighian Rasouli, Jinqiang Zhang, Edward H. Sargent and David Sinton.

EES. Catal., 2023,1, 54-61 DOI D2EY00046F

Meet the authors

David Sinton is a Professor in the Department of Mechanical & Industrial Engineering at the University of Toronto and Canada Research Chair. The Sinton group develops fluid systems for applications in energy and analysis. The group is application-driven and is currently developing fluid systems to produce renewable fuels from CO2 and to develop energy efficient industrial working fluids. Dr. Sinton is a Fellow of the Canadian Society for Mechanical Engineering, American Society of Mechanical Engineers, Engineering Institute of Canada, American Association for the Advancement of Science, Canadian Academy of Engineering, and Royal Society of Canada.

Yurou Celine Xiao is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Mechanical & Industrial Engineering at the University of Toronto. Celine’s research is focused on systems design for energy efficient carbon dioxide capture and utilization. She is a recipient of the Hatch Graduate Scholarship for Sustainable Energy Research and the Bert Wasmund Graduate Fellowships in Sustainable Energy Research.

We are delighted to welcome Professor Susan Habas from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), USA, as an Associate Editor for EES Catalysis, a new open access journal publishing high-quality research on energy and environmental catalysis.

Learn more about our new Associate Editor

Susan Habas is a Senior Scientist and Distinguished Member of Research Staff in the Catalytic Carbon Transformation and Scale-up Center at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL). She received her Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of California, Berkeley with Prof. Peidong Yang in 2008. Following her postdoctoral research at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and NREL, Susan joined the NREL research staff in 2012. Her current work focuses on the development of innovative catalysts for selective transformations of renewable and waste carbon sources to fuels and chemicals.

Her interests include the design and synthesis of nanostructured catalysts with tailored surface chemistry, continuous flow methods for scalable synthesis and discovery of catalytic materials, and non-thermal plasma catalysis. She is a Principal Investigator in the Chemical Catalysis for Bioenergy Consortium, leading a multi-national laboratory effort to advance new synthetic approaches and operando characterization capabilities for catalytic systems.

Read one of Susan’s papers published by RSC below:

An investigation into support cooperativity for the deoxygenation of guaiacol over nanoparticle Ni and Rh₂P

Michael B. Griffin, Frederick G. Baddour, Susan E. Habas, Connor P. Nash, Daniel A. Ruddy and Joshua A. Schaidle 

Catal. Sci. Technol., 2017,7, 2954-2966

Please join us in welcoming Professor Habas to EES Catalysis.

EES Catalysis is open for submissions. Find out more on the journal webpage, sign up for email alerts or submit your manuscript now.