Data Driven Catalyst Design and Optimization

Data Driven Catalyst Design and Optimization

Yongchun Hong*

University of California at Berkeley, Berkeley, CA 94720

*yongchun.hong@berkeley.edu

Research Interests:

In some heavily documented areas in catalysis, such as CO oxidation, data (kinetic, theoretical, and spectroscopic)  accumulated by our pioneers are beyond our capability to thoroughly summarize and survey, and new data are being reported by our peers at an unprecedented rate. It is even more challenging to consolidate those often contradictory observations. I am interested in developing a statistic based tools to analyze the data reported in the literature to allocate plausible mechanisms beyond those observations and to propose measurements or calculations to validate or invalidate those mechanisms with minimum efforts. Such efforts can be translated into standardized protocols that can be adapted by the catalysis community to facilitate the communication of observations. The statistical analysis of historical data and protocols that enable higher quality data acquisition will ultimately lead to a more comprehensive understanding of underlying mechanisms, that further enables a rigorous data-driven catalyst design and optimization that relies on the collective intelligence of the entire community instead of intuition and rigor of researchers in one of few groups.

Teaching Interests:

I have supervised 5 undergraduate students and mentored 1 graduate student during my academic training and I enjoy interacting with students with diverse backgrounds as well as sharing my knowledge and experience with them. I would like to develop and teach undergraduate courses on topics including catalysis, transport phenomena, and reaction engineering. I am especially interested in developing an undergraduate course that focuses on the basic concepts and applications of catalysis for students from Chemical Engineering and Chemistry backgrounds as well as other related disciplines because I found that such knowledge is essential for ChE and Chem students but also important for students from other related disciplines in the era of interdisciplinary cooperations. I would also like to develop and teach graduate courses on advanced topics including experimental and theoretical techniques in catalysis research because I think it is very important for graduate students to be aware of available tools to solve problems they encounter during their research, and more importantly, to explore new techniques by incorporating concepts and tools in other areas such as statistics and computer science.

Research Experience:

As a researcher in catalysis, I have 10 years’ research experience in various areas of heterogeneous catalysis, including catalyst syntheses, characterization, kinetic assessment and modeling, and molecular simulation. My formal training in catalysis started in Tsinghua University, focusing on the syntheses of Au and Au-based bimetallic catalysts and the exploration of their applications in oxidative abatement of CO and formaldehyde and in the selective hydrogenation of α,β-unsaturated carbonyl compounds. During my Ph.D. training in Washington State University and Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, I focused on the structure-performance relationship of Fe-based bimetallic catalyst in hydrodeoxygenation of bio-oil by correlating the structure information obtained via advanced in-situ characterization tools such as XAS, XRD, and XPS with the catalyst performance, and by accessing the mechanistic details based on kinetic inquiries and DFT simulation. I am currently working as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of California, Berkeley, and Lawerence Berkeley National Laboratory, pursuing a fundamental understanding of the catalytic consequence of oxygen binding properties of metal oxide on the abatement of N₂O in the engine exhaust via a combination of kinetic inquiries and DFT simulation.

Successful Proposals: XSEDE (PI), DOE (Participant)

Advisors and Collaborators: Prof. Enrique Iglesia (UCB, postdoctoral advisor); Prof. Yong Wang (WSU/PNNL, Ph.D. advisor); Prof. Bo-Qing Xu (THU, M.S. advisor); Dr. Andrew Getsoian (Ford); Prof. JeanSabin McEwen (WSU); Prof. Jun-Ming Sun (WSU); Prof. Franklin Tao (KU); Prof. Ayman Karim (VT); Mark Engelhard (PNNL); Dr. Janos Szanyi (PNNL).

Academic Services: Reviewer for ACS Catalysis, Applied Catalysis B, Journal of Molecular Catalysis A, ChemSusChem, RSC Advances, and etc.

Selected Publication:

1.     Hong, Y. C., Zhang, S. R., Tao, F., Wang, Y., ACS Catal. 7, 3639 (2017).

2.     Wang, X., Hong, Y. C., Shi, H., Szanyi, J., J. Catal., 343, 185 (2016).

3.     Hong, Y. C., et al., ACS Catal., 4, 3335 (2014).

4.     Hensley, A. J. R., Hong, Y.C., et al., ACS Catal., 4, 3381 (2014).

5.     Hong, Y. C., Sun, K. Q., Han, K. H., Liu, G., Xu, B. Q., Chem. Commun., 47, 1300 (2011).