A synthetic catalyst developed by Stanford University and SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory mimics the functionality of enzymatic products from biological organisms. The research, published in Nature Catalysis, demonstrates their synthetic enzyme could be applied to industrial catalyst production of methanol. As shown in their publication, synthetically created catalysts could yield methanol production with less energy expenditure and lower production costs.
With methanol demand growing as a fuel source due to its favorable emissions, when compared to gasoline, such applications are entering a favorable market. Researchers mimicked the natural enzymatic processes found in nature to inspire the synthesized enzymes. Their catalyst is made of palladium nanocrystals in a multi-layer porous polymer.