Jingguang Chen is Thayer Lindsley Professor of Chemical Engineering at Columbia University, and Thousand B Professor of Chemical Engineering at Tsinghua University. He is a world leader in surface science studies of carbide and bimetallic catalysts and their application to industrial applications. He has made great leaps toward closing the long standing, well-known materials and pressure gaps in heterogeneous catalysis that are essential to convert fundamental surface science studies into industrial practice. He has published over 240 papers, and written critical reviews for several leading review journals. His publications have 6,500 citations and an h-index of 44.

 

It is well known that metal carbides and bimetallic alloys often show unique properties in catalysis and electrocatalysis [1-3]. In the current talk we will use two classes of reactions to highlight the importance of using the combined approaches of DFT calculations and surface science experiments on model surfaces, and reactor and fuel cell evaluations over realistic porous catalysts. We will briefly describe DFT calculations of hydrogen binding energy (HBE) values on different carbide and bimetallic surfaces. We will then use the hydrogen evolution reaction in water electrolysis to illustrate the correlation between DFT-predicted HBE values and electrolysis activity over a wide range of carbide and bimetallic catalysts [4,5]. In the second class of reaction will use the hydrogenation of C=C bonds to demonstrate the correlation between HBE values and hydrogenation activity. We will also use the selective hydrogenation of 1,3-butadiene to illustrate than DFT calculations of HBE values are too simplistic for predicting the selectivity in hydrogenation reactions.

 

[1]  T.G. Kelly and J.G. Chen, “Metal Overlayer on Metal Carbide Substrate: Unique Bimetallic Properties for Catalysis and Electrocatalysis”, Chemical Society Reviews, 41 (2012) 8021-8034.

[2]  W. Yu, M.D. Porosoff and J.G. Chen, “Pt-based Bimetallic Catalysis:  From Model Surfaces to Supported Catalysts”, Chemical Reviews, 112 (2012) 5780-5817.

[3]  M.D. Porosoff, W. Yu and J.G. Chen, “Challenges and Opportunities in Correlating Bimetallic Model Surfaces and Supported Catalysts”, Journal of Catalysis (50^th Anniversary Special Issue), 308 (2013) 2-10

[4]  D.V. Esposito et al., “A New Class of Electrocatalysts for Hydrogen Production from Water Electrolysis: Metal Monolayers Supported on Low-Cost       Transition Metal Carbides”, Journal of the American Chemical Society, 134 (2012) 3025-3033.

[5]  W. Sheng et al., "Correlating Hydrogen Evolution Reaction Activity in Alkaline Electrolyte to Hydrogen Binding Energy on Monometallic Surfaces", Energy & Environmental Science, 6 (2013) 1509-1512