(2kn) Catalyzing the Future: Creating a Confined Environment for the Production of Sustainable Chemicals

Catalysis is of great importance in both chemistry and engineering areas. Remarkable catalysis research plays a crucial role in accelerating chemical reactions, reducing energy consumption and waste production, and therefore improving the overall efficiency and sustainability of chemical processes. In a broader mind, my research group will focus on deriving solutions within the following areas:

- Core components of catalysis on the sustainable production of fuels and chemicals as shown in the scheme below: from ‘understand the reaction’ to ‘design a GOOD catalyst and GREEN reaction system’.

- Make a GOOD catalyst REMARKABLE by performance-boosting technologies: screen for novel materials using big-data analysis tools and develop a synthesis method to obtain particles with an optimized nanostructure.

- Pushing the frontier of chemical innovations: reveal a complete mechanistic understanding with the aid of computation, spectroscopic, and imaging tools.

I will perform hypothesis-driven research focusing on designing heterogeneous catalysts with tailored structures and dissecting the precise mechanisms of surface chemistry in key renewable techniques. The work will, I believe, provide remarkable mechanistic insights into renewable chemical/fuel processes using a class of rationally designed heterogeneous catalysts.

Scheme 1. Sustainable Production of Fuels and Chemicals

Approach and Experiences:

To provide the industry and heterogenous catalysis society with new chemical pathways, I will adopt the following three strategies: (1) Designing a suitable reaction environment. This strategy involves the use of a proper reaction medium (such as the solvent), and/or the use of stimuli-responsive catalysts for applications that include the change in temperature, light, ultrasound, magnetic field, and electrical field. (2) Involving tandem reaction pathways to reduce the total Gibbs free energy of all steps in a catalytic cycle. This would be the most natural and facile approach to reduce the total energy needed in a process and the source of innovations in catalysis studies. (3) Creating an active surface with appropriate binding energy as directed by the transient state theory and Sabatier principle. The formulation and geometry of catalysts will be fine-tuned to optimally balance the requirements of all steps in the designed chemical route. This strategy is the key to making the carefully designed process happen.

With 9+ years of research experience, I gained a strong foundation in chemical engineering with expertise in heterogeneous catalysis, reaction engineering, material design/characterization, and renewable technologies. During my Ph.D. and postdoctoral training, I have benefited from collaborations across departments, universities, and national laboratories. In this procedure, I have successfully used or witnessed the successful use of the above three strategies. In addition, I have gained valuable skills in instrumental development, patent preparation, and funding application which ensures me establish a new lab faster. I sincerely look forward to speaking with the search committee at the AIChE annual meeting and follow-up interviews to explain the details as listed here.

Postdoctoral Projects:

- “Ozonolysis of aromatic compounds using liquid CO₂ as a green reaction medium” under the supervision of Dr. Bala Subramaniam, Department of Chemical and Petroleum Engineering, University of Kansas

- “Impact of nuclearity of Pt supported on iron oxide for CO₂ hydrogenation and aldol-condensation reactions” under the supervision of Dr. Johannes A. Lercher, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL)

PhD Dissertation:

- “Oxidation of Sugars and Polyols for Sustainable Production of Value-added Chemicals” under the supervision of Dr. Raghunath V. Chaudhari, Department of Chemical and Petroleum Engineering, University of Kansas

Teaching Experiences and Interests:

I am a passionate communicator who believes teaching benefits not only the students but also the professors. Through my graduate studies, I have served as Graduate Teaching Assistant for 6 undergraduate courses (as listed below) and coached 9 students on research activities. As an Assistant Professor, I hope to contribute my expertise in chemical engineering by teaching a diverse group of courses. I will be dedicated to making my classroom an inclusive learning space and implementing different research-based techniques to improve students’ critical thinking abilities. I will be comfortable teaching any undergraduate in the school of engineering. In addition, I am particularly interested in developing a new graduate-level course on the topics of green chemistry, industrial catalysis, and spectroscopy tools in catalysis research. I am also strongly motivated to develop suitable research programs for undergraduate students and encourage them to participate in national STEM competitions. The top three of my professional growth goals in teaching are: Firstly, always keeping pace with novel teaching technologies and methodologies. Secondly, I value comments from other faculties. I will invite the faculty members in the school to visit my class and comment on my teaching style. Their rich experiences in teaching are the most valuable source that can help detect small problems in the classroom. I will also attend conferences such as the AIChE annual meeting to talk with faculty from different schools or attend workshops for new or prospective faculty on effective teaching. Thirdly, I will keep active in doing research and writing for publications. I believe that the faculty’s knowledge is easy to be out of date without the habit of following industrial news and contributing to research. Moreover, lifetime learning is one of the most important sources of happiness, and I hope to set a good role model for my students.

University of Calgary, Calgary, AB, Canada

ENGG 201: Behavior of Liquids, Gases, and Solids (required undergraduate, 3 credits)

ENCH 551: Chemical Engineering Laboratory – Kinetics (required senior undergraduate, 2 credits)

University of Kansas, Lawrence, KS:

C&PE 211: Material & Energy Balance (required undergraduate, 4 credits)

C&PE 512: Chemical Engineering Thermodynamics II (required senior undergraduate, 3 credits)

C&PE 525: Heat & Mass Transfer (required senior undergraduate, 4 credits)

C&PE 623: Chemical Engineering Design II (required senior undergraduate, 2 credits)

Service Experiences:

Along with research and teaching, I am eager to participate in and develop community outreach activities at the university. During the past years, I have put this spirit of service into practice as a journal reviewer, volunteer, research competition judge, and invited speaker for minority groups (as listed below). As a faculty of chemical engineering, I hope to engage not only in compelling research in my field but also in the university’s academic and campus life as an integral member of the community.

Reviewer for (journals):

Applied Catalysis B: Environmental

ACS Sustainable Chemistry & Engineering

Journal of CO₂ Utilization

Frontiers in Chemistry

Journal of Nanomaterials

Chemistry Select

Volunteer for Get to Know Nuclear Girl Scout Event at Tri-cities, WA (November 2022)

Judge for 14^th Annual Postgraduate Research Symposium, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (August 2022)

Invited Speaker for the “Women in Engineering” Panel Discussion, University of Kansas (October 2019)

Judge for the Undergraduate Research Symposium, University of Kansas (April 2016 and April 2017)

Selected Awards:

Pacific Coast Catalysis Society Meeting (PCCS): 1^st Place Poster Award 2022

17^th International Congress on Catalysis (ICC): Young Scientist Presenter Award 2020

University of Kansas: Department Honor for the Ph.D. Final Defense 2019

North American Catalysis Society: Kokes Award for the NAM26 Conference 2019

4^th North American Symposium for Chemical Reaction Engineering: Travel Award

University of Kansas: Honored Doctoral Candidate for the Comprehensive Exam 2019

Great Plains Catalysis Society: GPCS Spring Symposium Graduate Travel Award 2019

American Chemical Society: Scholarship for the ACS Summer School on Green Chemistry and Sustainable Energy 2018

University of Kansas: Graduate Travel Fund by Department of Chemical & Petroleum Engineering 2017

University of Kansas: Graduate Engineering Association Travel Fund 2016

University of Calgary: Graduate Excellence Scholarship 2014

University of Calgary: Schulich Student Activity Fund (SSAF) 2014

University of Calgary: URGC International Student Travel Award 2014

Selected Publications:

Shi, H.; Lundin, M.; Danby, A.; Go, E. P.; Patil, A.; Zhou, H.; Jackson, T. A.; Subramaniam, B., Selective ozone activation of phenanthrene in liquid CO₂. RSC advances 2022, 12 (1), 626-630.

Shi, H.; Yin, X.; Subramaniam, B.; Chaudhari, R. V., Liquid-Phase Oxidation of Ethylene Glycol on Pt and Pt–Fe Catalysts for the Production of Glycolic Acid: Remarkable Bimetallic Effect and Reaction Mechanism. Ind. Eng. Chem. Res. 2019, 58 (40), 18561-18568.

Shi, H.; Thapa, P. S.; Subramaniam, B.; Chaudhari, R. V., Oxidation of glucose using mono-and bimetallic catalysts under base-free conditions. Organic Process Research & Development 2018, 22 (12), 1653-1662.

Shi, H.; Mahinpey, N.; Aqsha, A.; Silbermann, R., Characterization, thermochemical conversion studies, and heating value modeling of municipal solid waste. Waste Management 2016, 48, 34-47.

Dominguez, A. A. T.; Shi, H.*; Subramaniam, B.; Chaudhari, R. V., Aqueous-Phase Glycerol Catalysis and Kinetics with in Situ Hydrogen Formation. ACS Sustainable Chem. Eng. 2019, 7 (17), 15146-15146.

Jin, X.; Zeng, C.; Yan, W.; Zhao, M.; Bobba, P.; Shi, H.; Thapa, P. S.; Subramaniam, B.; Chaudhari, R. V., Lattice distortion induced electronic coupling results in exceptional enhancement in the activity of bimetallic PtMn nanocatalysts. Applied Catalysis A: General 2017, 534, 46-57.

Chen, L.; Meyer, L. C.; Kovarik, L.; Meira, D.; Pereira-Hernandez, X. I.; Shi, H.; Khivantsev, K.; Gutiérrez, O. Y.; Szanyi, J., Disordered, Sub-Nanometer Ru Structures on CeO₂ are Highly Efficient and Selective Catalysts in Polymer Upcycling by Hydrogenolysis. ACS Catal. 2022, 12 (8), 4618-4627.