报告题目：Production of Sustainable Fuels and Chemicals through Tuning of Reaction Microenvironment
报 告 人：Ya-Huei (Cathy) Chin，加拿大多伦多大学
时 间：2023年7月26日10:00
地 点：莫干山校区化工5号楼B306报告厅
报告摘要：
Catalytic production of fuels and chemicals from lignocellulosic biomass feedstock requires selective scission of strong C-O bonds in reductive reactions. At the molecular scale levels, the reactions involve the activation of hydrogen and oxygenates in a sequence of catalyst steps, occurred on multifunctional catalysts with acid and metal functions. Rates and product distributions depend sensitively not only on the active site structures but also on the immediate reaction microenvironments. Here, I will discuss how to tune the active site structures and the reaction microenvironments such that one would be able to alter the reaction free energy landscape and therefore the catalytic fates of the oxygenates in C-O bond scission catalysis. The focus of the talk is on understanding the charges of the reactive hydrogen species, through designing the active sites as well as the microenvironment, by selecting the solvents, invoking thermodynamics of non-ideal solution to drive catalysis and polarizing the reactive intermediates, including the transition states, to reduce the activation free energy. The specific case studies to be discussed are: (i) the tuning of the charge of reactive hydrogen species in the hydrogen attack catalysis, (ii) the tuning of microenvironment with solvent mixtures for C-H bond scission, and (iii) the use of polar protic solvent to stabilize the transition state and thus open up path of intra-molecular proton transfer in the C-O scission of substituted phenols. These case studies illustrate the opportunities in the catalyst rate and selectivity tuning, opening up possibility for increasing the atom efficiencies in the production of sustainable fuels and chemicals.
报告人简介：
Ya-Huei (Cathy) Chin是加拿大多伦多大学教授，也是加拿大可持续化学先进催化领域首席科学家（二级）。在2011年加入多伦多大学之前，Chin教授在美国加利福尼亚大学伯克利分校获得化学工程博士学位。此前，在美国太平洋西北国家实验室（PNNL）担任研究工程师（2000-2002年）和高级研究科学家（2002-2005年）。她近期研究集中于烷烃氧化以及氧化物转化为增值化学品和液体燃料过程的催化机理研究。具体而言，她通过结合同位素、动力学实验和理论计算等方法研究气-固相和液-固相界面催化反应中的催化动力学和反应机理。她目前担任Journal of Catalysis副主编，并是多个著名SCI期刊的编委会成员，包括Applied Catalysis B: Environmental、Reaction Chemistry and Engineering、Chem Catalysis，以及Canadian Journal of Chemical Engineering。
