Research Director

Shigeo Ted Oyama

Chemical System Engineering, School of Engineering, The University of Tokyo
Professor

Outline

A number of novel concepts to achieve high methane conversion and high selectivity to partial oxidation products will be employed. First, is the use of A+O2/AO system as an oxygen shuttle between O2 and the catalyst to obtain a ready source of atomic oxygen equivalents. Second, is the use of catalysts that allow methane to interact efficiently with limited amounts of oxygen by site isolation. Third is the shielding of the products from the active sites with catalyst structures to protect the products of reaction from sequential oxidation to CO2. Fourth, will be the use of porous inorganic membranes to contact the reactants at high concentration and at high pressure. Fifth, will be the use of advanced spectroscopy to monitor the sites and adsorbates in an efficient manner so that catalyst function can be assessed and improved.