Affordable and Accessible Methods for Catalyst Characterization

Supported metal catalysts have a wide variety of applications from petrochemical refining to pharmaceutical production. Characterizing catalysts is essential to understanding the reactivity and selectivity of the catalyst, to improve and apply catalysts to optimize a reaction. Affordable accessible technology to perform these readings is far and few between. Developing a method to characterize catalysts in house for smaller laboratories will open a new field of research and opportunity. An alternative to that fits this parameter is chromatographic characterization of supported metal catalysts. This technology utilizes gas chromatography to perform readings of absorbance of probe molecules over a catalyst that is inserted directly into the gas chromatograph. Gas chromatographs are found in nearly every laboratory and this advancement can create new found abilities for labs of all levels.