[BNC-all] FW: Biological Engineering faculty candidate seminar

[Willison, Sheryl L]

________________________________

From: Peer, Rebecca J. [mailto:peerb at purdue.edu] 
Sent: Friday, August 25, 2006 2:27 PM
To: dstarewi at ecn.purdue.edu
Subject: Biological Engineering faculty candidate seminar



 

Could you please forward this to people in your area that would be
interested.

 

Thanks,

 

 

Isa Mbaraka

 

 

 

 

BIOLOGICAL ENGINEERING CANDIDATE 

 

 

 

Research Seminar

 

Monday, August 28, 2006

8:30 - 9:30 a.m. - ABE 301

 

"Nanostructured Catalysts for Conversion 

of Biorenewable Feedstocks"

 

 

 

Abstract  -- 

 

Bioprocessing of biorenewable feedstocks will likely require the
development of new chemical processes as well as

biological processes for economical manufacture of chemicals and/or
fuels.  However, biorenewable feedstock 

conversion with heterogeneous catalysts provides new challenges in
inorganic catalyst research and development 

relative to the voluminous historical work with petrochemical
feedstocks.  These unique challenges include the need 

to selectively convert highly functionalized molecules and to develop
catalytic liquid-solid interfaces in which the 

liquid phase is commonly aqueous.  The implications of these
requirements on catalyst design will be discussed as 

motivation for the utilization of newly synthesized nanostructured
materials.  These catalyst structures with high 

surface areas and regular arrays of uniformly sized mesopores hold
promise for precise control of the reaction 

domain at the molecular level.  Presented will be results for the
application of acid-functionalized mesoporous 

catalysts for the conversion of lipids.  The influence on catalyst
performance due to the control of the pore 

diameter size as well as the modification of the site acidity and
hydrophobicity of the reaction domain will be shown.  

Finally, the potential use of nanostructured catalysts in achieving the
elusive goal of biomimetic catalysts will be discussed.

 

 

Thanks,

 

Becky

 

Becky Peer

Administrative Assistant

Ag. & Biological Engineering

225 S. University Street

Purdue University

West Lafayette, IN 47907-2093

Phone:  (765) 494-1162

Fax:  (765) 496-1115

 

 

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: /ECN/mailman/archives/bnc-all/attachments/20060825/46ea4385/attachment.html