Motivation for and Problems of HTE Approaches in Catalysis

However, although the possible benefits discussed above exist, so too do strong obstacles to the use of HTE techniques in catalysis. For the above-mentioned processes, it is certainly also possible that HTE approaches will not result in the discovery of a totally new catalyst, as world-wide research efforts of several hundred person-years have already been invested. Thus, the risk of failure is considerable. 

There are also many technical problems in applying HTE approaches to catalyst development. A catalyst, especially one for a heterogeneously catalyzed reaction, is an extremely complex system (Fig. 15.1). Looking only at the active phase, the nature of this is 

Accessibility of active sites Active phase/support interaction Particle sizes Formulation Influence of binders 

Number of different phases Surfaces expressed Promoters 

This creates a substantial problem as the synthesis of a heterogeneous catalyst is not easily scaled-up. A procedure which leads to an active catalyst on the milligram scale is not necessarily feasible on the gram scale.This means that it might not be easy to produce 

---