With a proud smile, MIT's Professor Jackie Ying held up a small glass jar containing a white fluffy powder resembling fresh snow on a very cold day. Further, the procedure for creating the material paves the way for materials that could improve other high-temperature processes such as the production of some chemicals. It will be reported in the January 6 Nature by Dr. Ying, an MIT Associate Professor of Chemical Engineering, and Andrey J. Zarur. Most are destroyed. Enter the case of natural gas as a fuel for power plants.
Natural gas is very abundant in the United States and environmentally friendly.
It produces less of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide than any other fossil fuel, Professor Ying said. Temperatures can go even higher as combustion continues. Burning at lower temperatures would create little NOx and cut emissions of greenhouse gases like unburned methane. Two groups of catalysts have been studied to that end. That was the challenge the MIT researchers decided to tackle.