Sustainable chemical synthesis with platinum

A new catalyst allows wood to replace petroleum in hydrocarbon synthesis

2021-04-19

(Press-News.org) Researchers used platinum and aluminum compounds to create a catalyst which enables certain chemical reactions to occur more efficiently than ever before. The catalyst could significantly reduce energy usage in various industrial and pharmaceutical processes. It also allows for a wider range of sustainable sources to feed the processes, which could reduce the demand for fossil fuels required by them. There are many chemicals used in a wide range of industries, including pharmaceuticals, that you probably don't notice in everyday life; for example, benzene, toluene, xylene and ethylbenzene, to name a few. These are created at chemical production plants that use petroleum to feed the processes in question. But there is now a way to produce those chemicals in a more sustainable way. Assistant Professor Xiongjie Jin and Professor Kyoko Nozaki from the Department of Chemistry and Biotechnology at the University of Tokyo and their team have created a new catalyst, a material that enables or speeds up a specific chemical reaction, that allows for more sustainable production of so-called aromatic hydrocarbons. At present the process typically requires temperatures of 200 degrees Celsius or more and pressures of 2 or more atmospheres. But with the team's new catalyst, the temperature can be brought down to between 100 degrees and 150 degrees Celsius, and the pressure to just 1 atmosphere, or ambient pressure. This could hugely reduce the energy cost of production. "Our 'Pt catalyst' makes use of platinum nanoparticles and an aluminum metaphosphate substrate, which is rarely ever used in catalysts," said Jin. "Source molecules interacting with this catalyst at the right temperature and pressure break down into useful aromatic hydrocarbon compounds. This process is called hydrogenolysis. But the most exciting part for us is not just that the catalyst improves reaction efficiency, but that it opens up new options for the kinds of source materials that can now be used in these processes." Currently, nonrenewable petroleum-based substances are used to create aromatic hydrocarbons, and this is not a sustainable scenario in the long run. The Pt catalyst allows the use of renewable woody biomass as source material, in particular a family of compounds known as lignins, which contain phenols, the basis of the reactions in question. Another benefit of the Pt catalyst is that it can be recycled and reused several times over. All these factors combined could lead to a vastly more sustainable way to produce aromatic hydrocarbons on an industrial scale. "We hope our study contributes to the (United Nations) Sustainable Development Goals by making industrially important chemicals from renewable resources instead of petroleum, and at a lower energy cost," said Jin. "Our next steps will be to further increase the lifetime of the Pt catalyst and also to make the catalyst work directly on lignins, mitigating the need to break it down into phenols before the reactions can take place."

INFORMATION:

Journal article Xiongjie Jin, Rio Tsukimura, Takeshi Aihara, Hiroki Miura, Tetsuya Shishido and Kyoko Nozaki, "Metal-support cooperation in Al(PO3)3-supported Pt nanoparticles for the selective hydrogenolysis of phenols to arenes" Nature Catalysis, DOI: 10.1038/s41929-021-00598-x Funding This work was supported by JSPS KAKENHI Grant Number JP18H05259, JP19K15357, JP20H04803 and JP17H06443. Links Graduate School of Engineering - https://www.t.u-tokyo.ac.jp/soee/index.html
Department of Chemistry and Biotechnology - http://www.chembio.t.u-tokyo.ac.jp/e/
The Nozaki Group - http://park.itc.u-tokyo.ac.jp/nozakilab/indexE.html Research contact information Assistant Professor Xiongjie Jin
Department of Chemistry and Biotechnology, Graduate School of Engineering,
The University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 113-8656, Japan
Email: t-jin@g.ecc.u-tokyo.ac.jp
Tel: +81-3-5841-7264 Press Contact Mr. Rohan Mehra
Division for Strategic Public Relations, The University of Tokyo
7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 113-8654, JAPAN
Email: press-releases.adm@gs.mail.u-tokyo.ac.jp

About the University of Tokyo The University of Tokyo is Japan's leading university and one of the world's top research universities. The vast research output of some 6,000 researchers is published in the world's top journals across the arts and sciences. Our vibrant student body of around 15,000 undergraduate and 15,000 graduate students includes over 4,000 international students. Find out more at http://www.u-tokyo.ac.jp/en/ or follow us on Twitter at @UTokyo_News_en.

[Attachments] See images for this press release:

ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

Ocean currents modulate oxygen content at the equator

2021-04-19

Due to global warming, not only the temperatures in the atmosphere and in the ocean are rising, but also winds and ocean currents as well as the oxygen distribution in the ocean are changing. For example, the oxygen content in the ocean has decreased globally by about 2% in the last 60 years, particularly strong in the tropical oceans. However, these regions are characterized by a complex system of ocean currents. At the equator, one of the strongest currents, the Equatorial Undercurrent (EUC), transports water masses eastwards across the Atlantic. The water transport by the EUC is more than 60 ...

NYU Abu Dhabi researchers develop Micro-Fluidic Probe to isolate cancer spreading cells

2021-04-19

Abu Dhabi, UAE, April 19: The survival rate of cancer patients can drop to ten percent or less during metastasis, the spread of cancerous cells to create secondary tumors. Therefore, it is crucial that cancer is detected and treated before metastasis occurs, or at least at its early stages. To spread the cancer, messenger cells known as Circulating Tumor Cells, or CTCs, break off of the original tumor and flow through the bloodstream to create a secondary growth. A team of researchers led by Assistant Professor of Mechanical and Biomedical Engineering and Principal Investigator at the NYU Abu Dhabi ...

Attacking aortic aneurysms before they grow

2021-04-19

A new study investigates a genetic culprit behind abdominal aortic aneurysm, a serious condition that puts people at risk of their aorta rupturing - a potentially deadly event. Finding a viable genetic target for AAA could change the game, says senior author Katherine Gallagher, M.D., a vascular surgeon and an associate professor of surgery and microbiology and immunology at Michigan Medicine, the academic medical center of the University of Michigan. That's because there are no medications to directly treat the condition and prevent an aneurysm from growing. Current options include things like addressing blood pressure to lower the stress on the arteries and veins running through the body, and making lifestyle changes like quitting smoking. Most people monitor their aneurysm ...

DNA robots designed in minutes instead of days

2021-04-19

COLUMBUS, Ohio - Someday, scientists believe, tiny DNA-based robots and other nanodevices will deliver medicine inside our bodies, detect the presence of deadly pathogens, and help manufacture increasingly smaller electronics. Researchers took a big step toward that future by developing a new tool that can design much more complex DNA robots and nanodevices than were ever possible before in a fraction of the time. In a paper published today (April 19, 2021) in the journal Nature Materials, researchers from The Ohio State University - led by former engineering doctoral student Chao-Min Huang - unveiled new software they call MagicDNA. The software helps researchers design ways to ...

Who is selling and trafficking Africa's wild meat?

2021-04-19

BRAZZAVILLE, Republic of Congo (April 19, 2021) - A new study classifies different types of wildlife traffickers and sellers in two of Central Africa's growing urban centers, providing new insight into the poorly understood urban illegal wildlife trade. The findings can help conservation and law enforcement authorities prioritize their efforts on professional criminals, identify patterns among repeat offenders, and determine if wildlife offenders are engaging in other types of crime. Authors from the University of Maryland and Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) describe their findings ...

National report highlights benefit of collaborative care models for people with dementia

2021-04-19

INDIANAPOLIS -- A new report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (National Academies) details the state of dementia care and research in America and provides guidance on future research to make sure both patients and their families are having their needs met by the care they receive. Sections of the report highlight the effectiveness of the collaborative care model as well as successful implementation, citing research from Regenstrief Institute, Eskenazi Health and the Indiana University School of Medicine. There are between 3.7 million and 5.8 million people living with dementia ...

Stone Age black bears didn't just defecate in the woods - they did it in a cave too

2021-04-19

Scientists have sequenced ancient DNA from soil for the first time and the advance will transform what is known about everything from evolution to climate change. The findings have been described as the 'moon landings' of genomics because researchers will no longer have to rely on finding and testing fossils to determine genetic ancestry, links and discoveries - and it is thanks to Stone Age black bears who defecated in a remote cave in Mexico 16,000 years ago. A team of scientists from The Lundbeck Foundation GeoGenetics Centre, University of Copenhagen, led by Professor Eske Willerslev, director of the foundation and a Fellow of St John's College, University of Cambridge, recreated ...

Sleep disorders and surgery: Anesthesia & Analgesia marks first decade of the Society of Anesthesia and Sleep Medicine

2021-04-19

April 19, 2021 - An estimated 50 million people undergo surgery each year in the United States, and a significant proportion of them have undiagnosed or untreated sleep disorders (SD) or sleep-disordered breathing (SDB). Issues at the intersection of anesthesiology and sleep medicine are the focus of the Society of Anesthesia and Sleep Medicine (SASM) whose 10th anniversary is commemorated in the special theme May issue of Anesthesia & Analgesia. The special issue looks back at a remarkable first decade of achievements in research and clinical practice by this young subspecialty society, while looking forward to further progress. A key ...

Two blood thinners at once: More risk with the same reward

2021-04-19

More blood thinners aren't automatically better, another study confirms. A new publication in JAMA Internal Medicine focuses on the minimal pros and the concerning cons of combining a daily aspirin with a drug from the newer class of anticoagulants that include apixaban, dabigatran, edoxaban and rivaroxaban. Patients were taking one of these direct oral anticoagulants known as DOACs to prevent strokes from non-valvular atrial fibrillation or for the treatment of venous thromboembolic disease (deep vein thrombosis or pulmonary embolism). The included patients did not have another reason to take aspirin ...

Gene therapy shows promise in initial trial for patients with childhood blindness

2021-04-19

PHILADELPHIA - A new gene therapy for one of the most common forms of congenital blindness was safe and improved patients' vision, according to initial data from a clinical trial led by researchers at the Scheie Eye Institute in the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. The therapy delivers working copies of GUCY2D to the eyes of patients who have severe vision impairments caused by mutations in the gene. Each of the first three treated patients experienced improvement in some aspects of vision, without serious side effects, according to the new study, published in the journal iScience. "We found sustained improvements in both day and night vision, even with a relatively low dose of the gene therapy," said study lead author Samuel G. Jacobson, MD, ...

Sustainable chemical synthesis with platinum

ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES: