The catalyst speedup toolkit

Paul Sabatier, joint winner of the 1912 Nobel prize in chemistry, introduced a principle surrounding the ideal characteristics of a catalyst, specifically relating to how strongly it should bind reactants and products. In the Sabatier principle if reactants adsorb too weakly, the catalyst remains too far away from them and doesn’t get the chance to accelerate their transformation to products. If, once reactants become products they bind too tightly, they may stay on the catalyst and prevent further reactions happening there.

The Sabatier principle is therefore deceptively powerful. Usually, it defines how fast any catalyst system can hope to be. It reflects how chemists typically design catalysis systems, optimising structures and conditions for the best function. More recently, however, scientists have been exploring ways to cheat the Sabatier limit. Here’s how these approaches might work…