Thin film technology is a key technology in many high tech sectors today and plays a crucial role in the development of photovoltaics. It allows to control of a very broad set of material (e.g.electronic or optical) properties down to the atomic level, yet can be compatible with high-volume low-cost manufacturing. The Catlab project aims to exploit exactly these characteristics of thin film technology for use in catalytic reactions, especially for chemical energy carriers, such as (green) hydrogen and carbon- or nitrogen-based chemicals derived from it. [more]

Catalysts degrade over time during reactor operation, resulting in loss of activity, as well as selectivity. A variety of physical and chemical phenomena contribute toward catalyst degradation, such as particle growth, coking, poisoning, or chemical reactions between the catalyst and the reaction medium, or between the active material and the catalyst support. Catalyst degradation is not always well-understood, and improving a catalyst's life time is often a trial-and-error process. This lecture will cover the fundamental causes of typical catalyst deactivation phenomena, introduce computational and experimental techniques to analyze catalyst degradation, and demonstrate practical examples to a rational approach to make catalysts more resistant to degradation. [more]

Model catalysts are specifically designed to address the complexity issue in catalysis. Real catalysts are very complex, which makes them a nightmare for scientists seeking to understand how these systems work. Typically, only a small part of the catalyst’s compositional and structural spectrum is relevant for the catalytic process. Consequently, much of the spectral and structural information stems from irrelevant parts of the catalyst, making the identification of relevant components a non-trivial and error-prone task. [more]

Electrochemistry plays a pivotal role in our future transition to sustainable energy, particularly for the conversion of electrical into chemical energy in electrolyzers, and the reverse conversion and utilization of the stored energy in batteries and fuel cells. The common challenge in these electrochemical devices is the development of active and durable materials for the catalysis. [more]