Auf der Jagd nach dem aktiven Zentrum - Video
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Our project
TrackAct - Tracking the Active Site in Heterogeneous Catalysis for Emission Control
More than 95% of all chemical products have seen a catalyst during their production, hence, catalysis plays a tremendeous role, presently being a 3 trillion $ / year market of chemical industry. Heterogeneous catalysis is a substantial part of it, and the great importance of emission control for environmental and human health is obvious.
Despite this importance, still very little is understood about the mechanisms on a truly atomic scale which is necessary for better control of function on all length scales up to the macroscopic. Consequently, catalyst design has been more empirical than knowledge-driven up to now. More than 60% of the noble metals produced worldwide are used in catalysis. As noble metals are finite resources, there is an urgent need to reduce their content in catalysts to the effective minimum, the so-called active site. Structural changes under process conditions and their pronounced heterogeneity often pose a great challenge for knowledge-based design. New perspectives are evolving, e.g. in the preparation of defined metal clusters/particles, their characterization, and theoretical modeling, allowing to track and fundamentally understand the active sites in catalytic systems. This is the starting point of this interdisciplinary Collaborative Research Centre, where we aim at a holistic understanding by linking the different length scales and catalyst complexity levels. Our scale-bridging approach connects three areas: (A) size-selected clusters and defined nanoparticles, (B) porous catalysts with noble metal particles of defined size on support oxides with oriented surfaces and (C) hierarchically structured catalysts at the reactor level.
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The goal of TrackAct is to identify and track the nature of the active site, to design and manipulate them from bottom-up across the various length scales, and - on a long-term vision - predict and actively control them during operation.
TrackAct officially started on January 1st 2021, press release from DFG and KIT.
Auf der Jagd nach dem aktiven Zentrum - Video
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Katalyseforschung auf drei Skalenebenen - Video
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Katalyseforschung auf drei Skalenebenen - Video
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Asad Asadli won the Best Poster Award at the 58th international Annual Meeting of German Catalytic Scientists (Jahrestreffen Deutscher Katalytiker) in Weimar. The poster entitled "Development of Catalyst Bed Concepts for Induction Heating for Emission Control" presented a collaborative work of the new project C06N with the group of TrackAct Mercator Fellow Prof. Dr. Silvia Gross - Congratulations!
We are thrilled to announce that our PI THomas Sheppard started his new position as Full Professor at TU Wien (link to press release)! There, he will continue his research on heterogeneous catalysis, the application of X-ray imaging for chemical processes and sustainable chemistry, in particular CO₂ conversion and power-to-X technologies. Congratulations!
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Stefanie Dehnen, Professor of Information-Based Materials Design and Nanoscience and of Inorganic Chemistry at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), was awarded one of the two Hector Science Prizes for the year 2024 on Friday, January 24, 2025. The Hector Foundation jury recognized Dehnen's contributions to the chemistry of cluster compounds and their utilization in materials science. In doing so, the researcher has opened up insights that have caused an international sensation and are being pursued worldwide.
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The paper of our colleagues from B02, C02 and A04 explores a single-step synthesis of dimethyl ether (DME) from syngas using bifunctional Pd/CeO2/γ-Al2O3 catalysts. The innovative approach leverages palladium colloids dispersed in a nanoscale cerium oxide matrix, significantly enhancing CO conversion and DME yield compared to traditional two-step processes. Detailed spectroscopic and microscopic analyses reveal the formation of highly dispersed palladium clusters within the cerium oxide matrix, contributing to the superior catalytic performance and stability.
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In their new study, our colleagues from INF together with A04 and B04 introduce CaRIn (https://carmen-754.pages.dev/#/home), a novel application within the CaRMeN platform, which enhances infrared spectroscopy analysis by simulating peak broadening in real-time using Gaussian functions. This tool significantly improves the visual comparability of spectra and integrates a comprehensive database, streamlining workflows for researchers in heterogeneous catalysis.
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How can we incorporate noble metal nanoparticles into highly constrained pore networks and achieve uniform particles? The group of our Mercator Fellow, Prof. Silvia Gross, together with colleagues from A07, B01, B02, and C02, successfully synthesized Pd nanoparticles supported on mesoporous silica. The catalyst demonstrated remarkable stability and activity, showcasing the potential of mesoporous silicas in advanced catalytic applications!
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