Presented By: Chemical Engineering
ChE SEMINAR: "Probing the structures and reactions of molecules at catalytic solid-liquid interfaces"
Susannah Scott, University of California, Santa Barbara
The ChE Seminar Series features guest speakers from various research backgrounds throughout the year. ChE faculty and graduate students are especially encouraged to attend.
Abstract: Widespread adoption of renewable forms of energy and feedstocks is likely to require much more catalytic processing in the liquid phase. Adapting catalysts optimized for converting fossil-fuel-derived hydrocarbons to handle renewable and recycled carbon is a major challenge, due to vast differences in volatility and solubility. Solvent effects arising from covalent and non-covalent interactions alter behaviors at solid surfaces and in porous catalytic materials, where interactions are strongly influenced by partitioning of molecules between the bulk liquid phase and the surface or pore volume. Nanoscale structuring of solvent molecules near these surfaces alters mobility and promotes or prevents adsorption of reactive molecules near active sites. We probe these effects at a molecular level using operando magic-angle-spinning (MAS) NMR, which is beginning to reveal the origins of solvent-induced activity and selectivity trends in heterogeneous catalysis.
Bio: Susannah Scott is a Distinguished Professor in both Chemical Engineering and in Chemistry & Biochemistry at the University of California, Santa Barbara. She received her Ph.D. in Inorganic Chemistry from Iowa State University, under the direction of Jim Espenson and Andreja Bakac, for her work on the activation of O2 and transition metal-catalyzed oxidation mechanisms. She was awarded a NATO Postdoctoral Fellowship for work with Jean-Marie Basset at the Institut de recherches sur la catalyse (CNRS) in Lyon, France. In 1994, she joined the faculty of the University of Ottawa (Canada), where she was named a Canada Research Chair. In 2003, she moved to the University of California, Santa Barbara, where she currently holds the Duncan and Suzanne Mellichamp Chair in Sustainable Catalysis and is Chair of the Santa Barbara Division of the University of California’s Academic Senate. She is an Executive Editor for ACS Catalysis, and a member of the Board of Reviewing Editors for Science. Her research interests include the design of heterogeneous catalysts with well-defined active sites for the conversion of conventional and unconventional carbon-based feedstocks, as well as environmental catalysts to promote air and water quality.
Abstract: Widespread adoption of renewable forms of energy and feedstocks is likely to require much more catalytic processing in the liquid phase. Adapting catalysts optimized for converting fossil-fuel-derived hydrocarbons to handle renewable and recycled carbon is a major challenge, due to vast differences in volatility and solubility. Solvent effects arising from covalent and non-covalent interactions alter behaviors at solid surfaces and in porous catalytic materials, where interactions are strongly influenced by partitioning of molecules between the bulk liquid phase and the surface or pore volume. Nanoscale structuring of solvent molecules near these surfaces alters mobility and promotes or prevents adsorption of reactive molecules near active sites. We probe these effects at a molecular level using operando magic-angle-spinning (MAS) NMR, which is beginning to reveal the origins of solvent-induced activity and selectivity trends in heterogeneous catalysis.
Bio: Susannah Scott is a Distinguished Professor in both Chemical Engineering and in Chemistry & Biochemistry at the University of California, Santa Barbara. She received her Ph.D. in Inorganic Chemistry from Iowa State University, under the direction of Jim Espenson and Andreja Bakac, for her work on the activation of O2 and transition metal-catalyzed oxidation mechanisms. She was awarded a NATO Postdoctoral Fellowship for work with Jean-Marie Basset at the Institut de recherches sur la catalyse (CNRS) in Lyon, France. In 1994, she joined the faculty of the University of Ottawa (Canada), where she was named a Canada Research Chair. In 2003, she moved to the University of California, Santa Barbara, where she currently holds the Duncan and Suzanne Mellichamp Chair in Sustainable Catalysis and is Chair of the Santa Barbara Division of the University of California’s Academic Senate. She is an Executive Editor for ACS Catalysis, and a member of the Board of Reviewing Editors for Science. Her research interests include the design of heterogeneous catalysts with well-defined active sites for the conversion of conventional and unconventional carbon-based feedstocks, as well as environmental catalysts to promote air and water quality.
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