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Topic Name: Storing hydrogen and producing abundant amino compounds for industrial applications
Category: Chemical
Research persons: Bertrand ,Guido Frey ,Vincent Lavallo Wolfgang Schoeller
Location: University of California,Riverside, CA 92521, United States
Details
A limitation in using hydrogen as a fuel in hydrogen-powered vehicles is the
difficulty involved in storing it in a cost-effective and convenient manner.
While it is possible to store hydrogen using metals, the resulting products
often can be prohibitively expensive and cause environmental problems.
Chemists at UC Riverside now offer a possible solution. A class of carbenes –
molecules that have unusual, highly reactive carbon atoms – can mimic, to some
extent, the behavior of metals, the chemists have found. Called cyclic alkyl
amino carbenes or CAACs, these organic molecules, the researchers report, could
be used to develop carbon-based systems for storing hydrogen.
Study results appear in the April 20 issue of Science.
In their experiments, the researchers found that the CAACs can split hydrogen
under extremely mild conditions, a behavior that has long been seen in metals
reacting with hydrogen.
“The mode of action of these organic molecules, however, is totally different
from that of metals,” said Guy Bertrand, a distinguished professor of chemistry
who led the research. “Moreover, the CAACs are able to split ammonia as well –
an extremely difficult task for metals.”
Bertrand explained that such a splitting of ammonia, under certain conditions,
can pave the way for transforming abundant and inexpensive ammonia into useful
amino compounds used to make pharmaceuticals and bulk industrial materials.
“This is one of the top challenges for the 21st century,” he said.
According to the UCR research team, the metal-mimicking carbenes offer another
low-cost and low-toxicity benefit: Scientists now may be able to use
non-metallic catalysts for a reaction, called “hydrogenation reaction,” which
plays a critical role in the food, petrochemical and pharmaceutical industries.
In their study, the researchers exposed a solution of CAACs to both gaseous
hydrogen and liquid ammonia. “We used nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy to
analyze the products,” said Guido Frey, the first author of the research paper
and a postdoctoral fellow, supported by the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation,
in Bertrand’s lab. “And we used single crystal X-ray diffraction analysis to
confirm the structure of the products.”
A carbene is a molecule that has a carbon atom with six electrons instead of the
usual eight. Because of the electron deficiency, carbenes are highly reactive
and usually unstable in nature.
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About Researchers::
Bertrand, Guy
Distinguished Professor
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College of Natural and Agricultural Sciences
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Chemistry
guy.bertrand@ucr.edu
Pierce Hall
Annex 302
University of California
Riverside, CA 9252
(951) 827-2719 (Voice)
(951) 827-4713 (Fax)
Funded:
The National Science Foundation and
Rhodia, Inc., provided
support for the study. Bertrand and Frey were joined in the research by the
following individuals at UCR: Vincent Lavallo, a graduate student; Bruno
Donnadieu, a research associate supported by the
Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique; and Wolfgang Schoeller, an
adjunct professor of chemistry.Guy
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