Strong representation of the CRC 1487 at the 57th Annual Meeting of German Catalysts

From March 13 to 15, 2024, the 57th Annual Meeting of German Catalysts took place in Weimar. The CRC 1487 “Iron, upgraded!” was represented by several members. The annual meeting offered lectures and posters on various areas of catalysis research such as (de)hydrogenation and new catalyst concepts. The lecture by Ben Feringa, who received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2016, was a special prelude. There were also many posters and presentations in which iron plays an important role in catalysis.

Four doctoral students from the CRC 1487 presented the new, exciting results of their research. The area of the oxide environment was represented by Danny Stark (A03, Prof. Etzold, TUDa), Jan Welzenbach (A02, Prof. Hess, TUDa) and Hannah Wilhelm (A02, Prof. Albert, TUDa). The area of the metallic environment was represented by Hannah Lamers (C05, Prof. Rose, TUDa).

Danny Stark gave a talk on iron molybdenum oxide catalysts for the sustainable synthesis of C2 building blocks via oxidative dehydrogenation (ODH) of ethanol. Jan Welzenbach reported in his lecture on the application of different operando spectroscopic approaches that contribute to the understanding of processes on the surface and in the material of iron molybdate for ODH. Hannah Wilhelm and Jan Welzenbach presented a poster on how Fe2(MoO4)3 catalysts in the selective oxidation of ethanol can be studied using coupled operando Raman spectroscopy and X-ray diffraction. This poster was also presented by Hannah Wilhelm with a short talk. Hannah Lamers gave a talk on the use of supported iron nanoparticles as a catalyst for the selective hydrogenation of acetylene under industrial front-end conditions.

The conference offered many opportunities to exchange ideas with other researchers in Germany and Europe. In particular, the work on the combined Raman-XRD concept provided plenty of space for interesting and exciting discussions. In the context of the conference, the contributions of the CRC were able to make an important contribution to iron research.

Report: Hannah Wilhelm, Jan Welzenbach