This Small Business Innovation Research Phase I project focuses on preparation of substitutes for scarce, strategically important metals. Platinum group metals are scarce, expensive, and have a number of desirable properties, resistance to chemical attack, excellent thermal stability, and excellent electrical conductivity. Perhaps the most useful property is the ability to catalyze a wide range of chemical reactions. The members of this group include platinum ($400/oz), ruthenium (($450/oz), rhodium ($1,200/oz), palladium ($400/oz), osmium ($500/oz), and iridium ($250/oz). The natural sources of these metals are found almost exclusively in South Africa, Russia, and Canada. Certainly, an inexpensive material with platinum-like properties that could be made from non-scarce materials would be of great value. As substitutes for platinum group metals, TDA proposes to produce and evaluate novel molecular metal carbide cluster materials. The molecular metal carbides are (MoC4)n and (WC4)m,, where n = 1 to 4 and m = 1 to 8. While the structures of these species have yet to be proven, reasonable structures have been proposed for which the Mo and W metal sites possess d8 electronic configuration (the same as the Platinum Group metals). In Phase I, TDA will produce test quantities of these materials, and characterize their ability to act as platinum-like catalysts for a variety of commercially important reactions.
