NSF-GACR: Engineering nanostructured electrodes for the selective recovery of homogeneous catalysts

Homogeneous catalysts are crucial for producing everyday products like chemicals, solar panels, and medicines. For instance, palladium-based catalysts are instrumental in creating and manufacturing new drugs. However, most of these catalysts cannot be reused after the reaction due to the difficulty in separating them from the products they help make.

Current recycling methods are costly and can damage the catalysts. Finding better ways to recycle these catalysts, especially those used to produce organic compounds, is essential for sustainable chemical manufacturing and larger-scale uses. One promising solution is using electrochemical methods to separate the catalysts from complex mixtures.

This approach can be integrated with renewable energy sources and allows the catalyst to be reused. This project aims to develop a sustainable electrochemical recycling method for important industrial catalysts, which will help minimize manufacturing waste and promote the reuse of valuable critical metals. The project also provides educational opportunities for high school and graduate students and builds a globally competitive workforce through international collaboration with researchers at the University of Chemistry and Technology (UCT), Prague.

Importantly, the project has the potential to enable the use of previously uneconomical reactions, driving innovation and economic growth.

The project aims to advance an electrochemical recycling approach for major classes of homogeneous catalysts for oxidation and cross-coupling while understanding the interfacial interactions of the catalyst species with the electrode across multiple scales. The project will pursue three parallel aims: (i) designing nanostructured, high-accessibility electrosorbents for recovering various palladium homogeneous catalysts, (ii) investigating the nanoscale charge-transfer and mechanistic binding of the catalysts at the surface of the electrodes, and (iii) developing multiscale modeling tools to optimize the design of a flow-through sorption cell.

This interdisciplinary project combines the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign team’s expertise in electrochemical separations and polymer design with the UCT Prague team’s knowledge of electrochemical engineering and interfacial electrochemical spectroscopy. The project is expected to contribute to global decarbonization efforts by substituting conventional thermal and chemical-based separation methods with electrochemical processes, especially in the context of industrial-scale reaction and separation processes.

Finally, enabling homogeneous catalyst recycling can unlock access to new, previously uneconomical reactions that perform advantageously at an industrial scale. Educational and broader impact goals include (i) creating summer camp modules on electrochemistry, (ii) enhancing undergraduate and graduate mobility and student exchanges between the U.S. and Czech Republic, and (iii) creating joint international classes on electrochemical engineering and separations.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.