This award supports Gar Hoflund and two graduate students from the University of Florida in a collaboration with the laboratory of Horst Hahn of the Materials Science Department at the University of Darmstadt, Germany. The goal of the research is to develop novel methane oxidation catalysts for use in catalytic converters in automobiles that run on natural gas. The catalysts will consist of noble metals such as silver, palladium, gold, and platinum. A novel aspect of the work will be the use of nanocrystalline oxide supports. Natural gas as a fuel is less costly per unit of energy than gasoline, and, if properly burned, less damaging to the environment. The catalysts studied in this work are designed for long life and high efficiency.
