He also serves as an adjunct professor of chemistry. He is continuing his interaction with the industry by serving as a consultant. A main component of Professor Farcasiu's research is the study of acid strength of strong acids and superacids in solution and of acid sites on solid surfaces, for relating the nature and strength of acidity of solids with that of acids in solution. Having shown that the traditionally used Hammett acidity measurements are in principle inapplicable to solid acids and are useless for the study of most liquid acid catalysts of practical importance, he has introduced and is developing NMR probes of strong and superacidity. Another field of research consists of studies of mechanism of catalytic reactions, by kinetic measurements, investigation of structure-reactivity relationships, and determination of the structure of intermediates by spectroscopic technique.
Special attention is paid to the carbocation intermediates of strong acid-catalyzed reactions.
The role of one electron transfer in the reactions of hydrocarbons on solid acid catalysts is also studied. The design and synthesis of organic molecules which can be used as models for the mechanistic studies is being pursued. Structural and energetic features of reaction intermediates are also examined computationally, with ab initio MO and molecular mechanics calculations. Thus, conformational analysis by computer of straight chain hydrocarbons has led to a new model of reactivity on zeolite catalysts, and an evaluation of relative reactivity of sites within zeolite channels and on the external surface of the zeolite crystals. The implications and consequences of this theoretical model is being tested experimentally by a study of reactions of model molecules.