Future catalytic reaction engineering

Catalytic reaction engineering forms a link between chemistry and chemical engineering and is the key to catalytic process improvement and innovation. Catalysis is a branch of the chemical sciences that strongly affects frontier research in physical chemistry, organometallic chemistry and reaction engineering. The rapid development of modern chemistry and physics promises an interesting and rewarding future. 

Since the first synthesis of ammonia, catalyst development and chemical reaction engineering have been instrumental in the creation of the chemical process industry. As a result, catalytic processes have contributed much to the realization of prosperous civilizaticm. In the future, catalytic processes are expected to fulfill important roles in petroleum refining, diemical processing and environmental preservation. However, at present, many catalytic processes discharge large amounts of byproducts and consume large amounts of auxiliary raw materials. 

As the above examples illustrate, the kinetics of surface-catalytic events depend on complex structural and electronic considerations that, thus far, have not been understood at the level of detail that would permit predictive mathematical modeling and therefore rational design. For this reason, the molecular-level engineering of catalytic surfaces harbors perhaps the greatest future potential for chemical reaction engineering, at least from the standpoint of the design of catalysts. 

This chapter focuses on the catalytic aspects of methanol chemistry and covers thermodynamic, kinetic, chemical engineering, and materials science aspects. It provides brief introductions into these topics with the aim of establishing an overview of the state of the art of methanol chemistry with only a snapshot of the relevant literature. It highlights what the authors think are the most relevant aspects and future challenges for energy-related catalytic reactions of methanol. It is not meant to provide a complete literature overview on methanol synthesis and reforming. 

In the future, porous catalytic MIP membranes could also serve as a key element for advanced integrated bio-mimetic processes in reaction engineering [112,113]. 

The evolution of chemical engineering from petroleum refining, through petrochemicals and polymers, to new applications is de.scribed so that students can see the relationships between past, present, and future technologies. Applications such as catalytic processes, environmental modeling, biological reactions, reactions involving solids, oxidation, combustion, safety, polymerization, and multiphase reactors are also described. 

Research on the direct conversion of chemical energy to electricity via fuel cells has received considerable attention in the past decades. Fuel cells are indeed attractive alternatives to combustion engines for electrical power generation in transportation applications and also as promising future power sources, especially for mobile and portable applications. Thus, the search for excellent electrocatalysts for the electro-catalytic oxygen reduction and methanol oxidation reactions, which are the two important cathodic and anodic reactions in fuel cells, is intensively pursued by scientists... 

The last systematic description of heme peroxidases was published in 1999 by Brian Dunford, from the University of Alberta in Canada. The book Heme peroxidases covers discussion on three-dimensional structure, reaction mechanism, kinetics, and spectral properties of representative enzymes from bacterial, plant, fungal, and animal origin. Since 1999, vast information on basic but also applied aspects of heme peroxidases has been generated. We believe fusion of these two aspects will benefit research of those dedicated to development of biocatalytic process. The aim of this book is to present recent advances on basic aspects such as evolution, structure-function relation, and catalytic mechanism, as well as applied aspects, such as bioreactor and protein engineering, in order to provide the tools for rational design of enhanced biocatalysts and biocatalytic processes. The book does not include an exhaustive listing of references but rather a selected collection to enrich discussion and to allow envisioning future directions for research. 

There is, however, space for future development, particularly based on the synergic cooperation between catalysis, physicochemical characterization, and engineering groups. Hopefully, along with this contribution, a multitude of new catalytic and ecoefficient Friedel-Crafts acylation reactions will be investigated, providing the instruments to develop new sustainable synthetic routes to aromatic ketones. 

Scientists and engineers connected with the oil industry have endeavored with great success to make the most of our oil resources by increasing the quahty and quantity of products obtained from each barrel of oil. They have found that catalytic methods rather than straight thermal reactions are much more satisfactory for control of selectivity. As a result, all modern refineries are largely plants where catalysis predominates and is used on a very large scale. The supplanting of thermal methods by catalysis will continue in the future and newer catalytic processes will replace older catalytic ones as we develop more efficient methods. 

Even though the chemistry and engineering of HDS and HDN have been in continuous development and industrial application for decades, new environmental constraints have produced a resurgence of the field, particularly an intensified search for novel catalysts capable of meeting present and future standards for cleaner fuels. Despite impressive practical achievements over the last 40-50 years, new discoveries have been delayed by the lack of a better understanding of some key issues, notably the nature of HDS-HDN active sites on metal sulfide catalysts and the details of the elementary reactions implicated in the catalytic schemes. Within this context, organometallic chemistry has become an additional powerful tool for understanding the and... 

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