July 11, 2015

The latest Purdue Catalysis Center (PCC) outreach activity, in partnership with the Purdue Women In Engineering Program, took place on Saturday, July 11, 2015 in the Forney Hall Fundamentals Laboratory and Henson Atrium. The event, Engineering FYI: For Your Imagination, provided a day-long program of activities to more than 100 junior high students and their parents, designed to increase interest in engineering among rising 7-9th grade students. PCC members provided an engaging day of activities that showed how catalysis is important to medicine, energy, the environment, and everyday life.

In the Henson Atrium, the students observed a presentation describing the basics of catalysis and several chemistry and catalysis demonstrations, and performed hands-on experiments with ethanol and hydrogen fuel cells that illustrated concepts in renewable energy sources. In the Fundamentals Laboratory in Forney Hall, the students measured hydrogen peroxide decomposition rates with a liquid sodium iodide catalyst, and learned how reactant concentration influenced the reaction rate, which is a basic concept in catalysis. The decomposition of hydrogen peroxide is a reaction that also is catalyzed by enzymes (biological catalysts) to breakdown harmful metabolic byproducts in humans and living organisms.

Graduate student Viktor Cybulskis, who is co-advised by Professors Fabio H. Ribeiro and W. Nicholas Delgass, and assistant professor Raj Gounder developed and led the outreach event on behalf of the PCC. PCC graduate student researchers Jonatan Albarracin, Ravi Joshi, Ishant Khurana, Juan Carlos Vega-Vila; undergraduate researcher Jacklyn Hall; and visiting high school researcher Anahi Rostro supervised the hands-on activities and demonstrations.