A New Zeolitic Catalyst with Potential Industrial Applications in Propylene Production...

摘要

Researchers at the Institute of Chemical Technology,a joint centre of the Spanish National Research Council(CSIC)and the Polytechnic University of Valencia,have developed a new zeolitic catalyst stable at high temperatures that could have industrial applications in the production of propylene.The results of the research have been licensed to a company. The researchers at the Institute of Chemical Technology set themselves a triple challenge: to generate subnanometric metal clusters,which are small groups of a few atoms,within a zeolite;to stabilize them by controlling their reactive properties;and to do everything in a purely siliceous MFI zeolite to avoid the presence of acids in the final material.”Subnanometric metal clusters pose the problem of sintering at high temperatures above 500 °C.This means that they tend to cohere in blocks,which limits their catalytic application.That's why we think zeolites could serve as an ideal support for stabilizing subnanometric metal catalysts,”explains Avelino Corma,CSIC researcher at the Institute of Chemical Technology.