High-Throughput Screening as a Supplemental Tool for the Development of Advanced Emission Control Catalysts: Methodological Approaches and Data Processing

A high-throughput (HT) screening platform developed at hte with the application focus on automotive catalysis is described. hte HT units are configured for performing steady-state testing, as well as dynamic tests with fast feed switches, such as lean/rich excursions for the evaluation of NOx storage capacity and efficiency of lean NOx traps (LNT), ammonia storage capacity for selective catalytic reduction (SCR), evaluation of oxygen storage capacity (OSC), as well as lambda sweep tests for screening of three-way catalysts (TWC). Even though catalysts are screened on a rather small scale (similar to 100 mg powder), experience showed that dosing rather complex gas mixtures in concentrations close to that found in real exhaust for the given application is mandatory to generate relevant data. The objective of this work is to give additional insight into HT technology. In the industrial research laboratory, HT screening has matured to become a reliable approach for rapid screening of both reaction parameter spaces, as well as material properties relevant for exhaust gas catalyst development. Due to the speed of optimized screening involving 48 parallel reactors, automated handling of primary data is an imported requirement. Software for data reduction, like estimation of light-off temperature, needs to be robust and handle results for diverse sample libraries in an unattended fashion. In combination with the statistical design of experiment and multivariate data analysis, HT testing has become a valuable enhancement to automotive catalyst development.