International exposure for Wachs group's work in catalysis

Members of the research group of Israel Wachs, professor of chemical engineering, have spent a busy six weeks, much of it sharing the results of their catalysis research with Spanish-speaking peers.

On May 21, Wachs was elected director and Sukwon Choi, a Ph.D. candidate in chemical engineering, was elected secretary of the Catalysis Society of Metropolitan New York for 2003-04. Choi becomes the first graduate student ever to hold an elected position with the society.

On June 1, at the request of the Technology for a Sustainable Environment (TSE) program run by the National Science Foundation and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Wachs organized an international workshop on Environmentally Benign Process Research Needs. Wachs made a presentation titled "NSF Recommendations" and Choi gave a talk on "Pollution Profiles of the Pulp and Paper Industry." Hanjing Tian, a graduate student in chemical engineering, also took part in the workshop.

Choi and Tian then received Kokes Student Awards to attend the 18th North American Meeting of the Catalysis Society held June 1-6 in Cancun, Mexico. Choi gave a presentation on "Oxidesulfurization of Organosulfur Compounds" and Tian gave a presentation on "Comparison of UV- and visible Raman spectroscopy of Bulk Metal Molybdates and Vanadates." Wachs gave a presentation titled "Designing the Activity/Selectivity of Surface Acidic, Basic and Redox Active Sites in the K2O-V2O5/Al2O3 Catalytic System," which was co-authored by Xiang Wang, a research associate at Lehigh.

At the same meeting, a joint Lehigh-Rice University oral presentation was made by Michael S. Wong, professor of chemical engineering at Rice, on "The Nature of Highly Unusual Tungsten Oxo Species in Tungstated Zirconium Oxide Nanoparticle-Based Mesoporous Materials." Yongshen Chen, a graduate student in chemical engineering, gave a poster on "Synthesis, Characterization and Catalysis of Supported Tantalum Oxide Catalysts," while Laura Briand, a visiting scientist from the National University of La Plata in Argentina, spoke on "Quantitative Determination of the Number of Active Surface Sites and Methanol Oxidation TOF values for Bulk Metal Molybdate and Vanadate Catalysts." Wachs gave a poster on "The Origin of the Ligand/Electronic Effect in Mixed Metal Oxide Catalysts" that was co-authored by Wang.

During the American Chemical Society's 36th Middle Atlantic Regional Meeting held June 8-11 at Princeton University, Wachs gave a lecture at a session on Nanotechnology, Environment and Energy. The lecture, co-authored with Choi, was titled " Oxidesulfurization (ODS) of Organosulfur Compounds."

From June 22-25, Wachs served on a Ph.D. committee at the Institute of Catalysis and Petroleum Chemistry at the University of Cantoblanco in Madrid. He also gave the plenary lecture at the Spanish Catalysis Society Meeting in Malaga, discussing "Converting Pollution to Profits -  Modern Alchemy," an essay that was co-authored by Choi.

On June 26-27, Wachs gave two lectures at the Spanish Catalysis School for Spanish graduate students conducting catalysis research. His first seminar was titled "The Origin of the Ligand/Electronic Effect in Mixed Metal Oxide Catalysts" and was co-authored by Wang. The second seminar was titled "Designing the Activity/Selectivity of Surface Acidic, Basic and Redox Active Sites in the K2O-V2O5/Al2O3 Catalytic System" and was co-authored by Wang and Chunli Zhao, a graduate student in chemical engineering.