The Importance of Catalysis in the Conversion of Renewable Resources to Useful Biomaterials

2007 Spring Symposium

 
Tim­o­thy D. Gierke
DuPont Cen­tral Research and Devel­op­ment
P. O. Box 80328
Wilm­ing­ton, DE 19880–0328
timothy.​d.​gierke@​usa.​dupont.​com


Abstract — With the increas­ing price of oil and the grow­ing empha­sis on sus­tain­able busi­ness prac­tices, many com­pa­nies are look­ing at the oppor­tu­ni­ty to cre­ate new process tech­nol­o­gy to con­vert renew­able resources into new or exist­ing com­mer­cial mate­ri­als. Cat­a­lysts, whether they are chem­i­cal based or bio­log­i­cal­ly based, are con­sis­tent­ly key enabling com­po­nents for these new process­es. This pre­sen­ta­tion will give an overview of DuPont activ­i­ty in this area with an empha­sis on our recent work to devel­op biobased cat­a­lysts and cre­ate new process tech­nol­o­gy for bio­ma­te­ri­als.