MIT chemical engineers design new catalyst converting methane into polymers

In Massachusetts, MIT chemical engineers have now designed a new catalyst that can convert methane into useful polymers, which could help reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The new catalyst works at room temperature and atmospheric pressure, which could make it easier and more economical to deploy at sites of methane production, such as power plants and cattle barns.

At the molecular level, methane is made of a single carbon atom bound to four hydrogen atoms. In theory, this molecule should be a good building block for making useful products such as polymers. However, converting methane to other compounds has proven difficult because getting it to react with other molecules usually requires high temperature and high pressures.

To achieve methane conversion without that input of energy, the MIT team designed a hybrid catalyst with two components: a zeolite and a naturally occurring enzyme. Zeolites are abundant, inexpensive clay-like minerals, and previous work has found that they can be used to catalyze the conversion of methane to carbon dioxide.

In this study, the researchers used a zeolite called iron-modified aluminum silicate, paired with an enzyme called alcohol oxidase. Bacteria, fungi, and plants use this enzyme to oxidize alcohols.

This hybrid catalyst performs a two-step reaction in which zeolite converts methane to methanol, and then the enzyme converts methanol to formaldehyde. That reaction also generates hydrogen peroxide, which is fed back into the zeolite to provide a source of oxygen for the conversion of methane to methanol.