Application of High Throughput Screening to Heterogeneous Liquid and Gas Phase Oxidation Catalysis

The application of combinatorial methods to oxidation catalysis in the liquid and gas phases is described. New lead materials have been discovered for the selective liquid phase oxidation of alcohols to aldehydes/ketones catalyzed by vanadium supported on carbon, for the low temperature CO oxidation/light off for cold start automotive emissions control over supported noble metals and perovskites, for volatile organic compound (VOC) removal using CoCr oxide catalysts, and for the selective gas phase oxidation of propane to acrylic acid and acrylonitrile using mixed metal oxides. Catalyst discovery libraries were screened in 96-well batch reactors, in a rapid serial scanning mass spectrometer and in a massively parallel microfluidic reactor as primary screens. Promising hits were scaled up in conventional autoclaves or in multi-channel fixed bed secondary/tertiary screening reactors.