In collaboration with Purdue’s Women in Engineering Program, the Purdue Catalysis Center (PCC) hosted 32 local 6^th – 8^th grade students on October 20^th and November 3^rd for the fall 2015 Innovation to Reality (I2R) program.  The theme was “Energized Engineering for the Environment.”

Participants learned about how catalysts are used in environmentally friendly processes, such as the conversion of chemical energy to electrical energy in an ethanol fuel cell as well as the epoxidation of propylene with hydrogen peroxide, which is an environmentally-benign (“green”) oxidant. The students also participated in hands-on laboratory activities with model ethanol fuel cells and measured rates of hydrogen peroxide decomposition in the Fundamentals Laboratory in the Forney Hall of Chemical Engineering. Additionally, student participants toured the PCC research laboratories where they learned about the instruments used to study catalytic reactions and about how catalysts are used to treat diesel engine exhaust with the aid of a cut-out display of an actual catalytic converter, provided courtesy of Johnson-Matthey.

The event was led by PCC graduate students Viktor Cybulskis and Phil Kester along with Prof. Raj Gounder. PCC graduate students Jason Bates, Jonatan Albarracin, Michael Cordon, Ravi Joshi, Ishant Khurana, Arthur Shih, Juan Carlos Vega-Vila, and Rob Warburton facilitated the hands-on activities and lab tours.