HBU Publishes Significant Findings in Nature Catalysis

Recently, the research team from the Carbon Neutrality Research Center at the School of Physical Science and Technology of our university achieved important results in the field of high-purity carbon monoxide (CO) production. The related research, titled "High-Purity Carbon Monoxide Production via Photothermal Formic Acid Decomposition over Fluorite ZrO2," was published in the prestigious international journal Nature Catalysis, with Hebei University as the primary affiliation. Dr. Li Yaguang from the School of Physical Science and Technology is the first and corresponding author, while Professor Ye Jinhua and Researcher Luo Yanhong from the Chinese Academy of Sciences are co-corresponding authors.

High-purity carbon monoxide (CO) is a specialty gas widely required in high-tech industries such as integrated circuit manufacturing. The traditional methods for producing high-purity CO heavily rely on advanced gas separation technologies, which extract CO from mixtures containing various gases such as CO, H₂, and CH₄. This process leads to environmental pollution, high costs, and a significant dependence on foreign imports. To address the bottleneck issue in the production of high-purity CO, our university collaborated with a team from the Institute of Physics at the Chinese Academy of Sciences. By combining theoretical and practical approaches, they innovatively employed a novel zirconia catalyst to catalyze the photothermal decomposition of formic acid using a solar energy photothermal reaction system, achieving direct production of high-purity CO without relying on gas separation technologies. Statistics indicate that under outdoor lighting conditions, this photothermal system can produce approximately 1,538 liters of high-purity CO per square meter per day, demonstrating immense industrial application potential and opening a new pathway for producing high-purity gases using green energy.

This research work was supported by funding from the National Natural Science Foundation, the Hebei Provincial Natural Science Foundation, the Hebei Provincial Department of Education, interdisciplinary projects at Hebei University, the Institute of Life Sciences and Green Development at Hebei University, and strong support from the Public Testing Center of the School of Physical Science and Technology at Hebei University.