 |
Professor
and Associate Dean for Research
(614) 292-6623; ozkan.1@osu.edu
Education
B.S., Middle East Technical University,
1978
Ph.D., Iowa State University, 1984<
/blockquote>
Honors
OSU Distinguished Scholar Award, 1999
Pittsburgh-Cleveland Catalysis Society Award,
1998
Keck Outstanding Engineering Educator Award,
1994
Society of Professional Engineers, Outstanding
Engineering Educator of Ohio Award, 1991
|
|
|
 Our
research program is in the general area of heterogeneous catalysis. Our
goal is to acquire a fundamental understanding of the nature of active
sites on catalyst surfaces and the catalytic reaction pathways and ultimately
to be able to design catalysts with the desired molecular architecture
for specific reactions.
 Recently,
we have been focusing on three groups of catalytic reactions. The first
one is partial oxidation or oxidative dehydrogenation of lower alkanes.
These are very important reactions for converting low-value hydrocarbons
to high-value added products and intermediates. Selectivity control is
the major challenge in these reactions. The second group involves application
of catalys
is in the protection of the environment. The reactions we are
focussing on are reduction and decomposition of nitrogen oxides and reduction
of sulfur dioxide. The third group of reactions involves removal of heteroatoms
from petroleum and coal derivatives. We are especially interested in hydrodenitrogenation
and hydrodeoxygenation reactions.
 In
all of these projects, we put some of our effort into synthesizing catalysts
with the desired catalytic properties, using a wide variety of techniques,
ranging from solid-state chemistry to sol-gel techniques. The catalytic
materials we use include metal oxides, metal nitrides, metal sulfides,
supported metals, and heteropoly compounds. Some of our time and effort
are spent in the characterization of the catalysts throughout their life
history using microscopic, spect
roscopic, and thermal analysis techniques.
These techniques include X-ray diffraction, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy,
scanning and transmission electron microscopy, laser Raman spectroscopy,
diffuse reflectance Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy, and temperature-programmed
reduction/desorption and thermogravimetric analysis. Our major effort is
in the area of reaction kinetics, where we try to elucidate reaction pathways
and identify the active sites. We use flow reactor systems that operate
either at steady state or at transient mode. We analyze the feed and product
streams using a combination of techniques, such as gas chromatography,
mass spectrometry, high-performance liquid chromatography, and chemiluminescence.
We also make use of isotopic labeling techniques quite heavily to differentiate
between reaction pathways. We use isotopic labeling techniques for both
steady-state reaction studies and for transient response experiments. .
|
