Catalysis

Catalysis is at the core of the chemical industry and is the enabling technology for state-of-the-art clean energy conversion applications. However, current catalysts are mostly limited to 1–3 elements due to the increasing challenging (e.g., immiscibility) of alloying multiple elements at the nanoscale. We have invented a series of facile yet highly effective high-temperature shock techniques that enable the synthesis of uniformly distributed, single-phase multielemental (≥ 3) nanoparticles, including metallic alloys, oxides, carbides, and intermetallics. The successful synthesis of these multielement (high-entropy) nanoparticles greatly broadens the material choice for catalysts to a virtually unlimited compositional space. At CMI, we are interested in inventing and applying low cost yet durable catalysts for wide-ranging technologies.