THE PREPARATION OF A GOOD CATALYST STARTS WITH THE SELECTION OF THE APPROPRIATE SUPPORT
that include good textural properties such as surface area, porosity, and pore volume. The catalyst’s support plays an important role in the activity and selectivity of the catalyst. The surface area on one hand, permits loading and dispersing of the active species, while the support’s pore size will control diffusion of the reactant molecules to reach the active species that are located inside the internal area of the pores. Therefore, using the physisorption technique to elucidate the textural properties of the support, must be the first and most important task. The quimisorption techniques - normally called TPX techniques - are widely used to study the role of the support to stabilize and disperse the active species under the reaction conditions of high temperature and pressure that easily could sinter the active particles, and thus, yield a fast deactivation of the catalyst.

The Sabatier reaction was carried out in this study by reducing CO2 with H2 to produce CH4 using Ni supported catalysts. Two catalysts were used having about 5% Ni and supported on a different surface area material. Slowly increasing the reactor temperature (about 2C/min) from ambient, and online following the appearance of the products by a mass spectrometer, permits to follow step by step the evolution of the reaction and the appearance of the products as a function of the increasing temperature.

SESSION 1: 8:00 CDT | 9:00 EDT | 13:00 GMT | 14:00 CET

SESSION 2: 9:00 PDT | 10:00 MDT | 11:00 CDT | 12:00 EDT

Dr. Yunes received his B.S. degree in Chemistry from the Central University of Venezuela. He received both his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Physical Chemistry from Catholic University of Louvain, Louvain-La-Neuve, Belgium, with “La Plus Grande Distinction,” the highest honor to be granted by the University. His Ph.D. thesis was carried out under the supervision of Prof. Bernard Delmon, worldwide authority in the field of catalysis.

Dr. Yunes is recognized worldwide for his contribution to the field of adsorption and the application of adsorption techniques to the characterization of solids, particularly catalysts.

Dr. Yunes joined Micromeritics in May 1984, where he held the position of the Application Scientist, conducting experiments on adsorption, assisting the development of new products and writing application notes. His primary function at Micromeritics was to support customers worldwide with their applications, and to find or assist in developing new technologies to meet the needs of customers.