Key properties of silicate glasses are highlighted including the capability of stabilizing disperse Pd nanoparticles in the bulk of glass fibers (GF), high solubility of acetylene and hydrogen, as well as their high mobility. These properties provide the high activity and selectivity of Pd/GF catalysts to hydrogenation of acetylene in excess ethylene over a wide range of acetylene conversions up to its complete one. For a wide variety of mono-, bimetallic systems including catalysts with single palladium atoms, TOF was established to depend only slightly on the palladium dispersion and support nature, i.e. the reaction can be considered structure-insensitive. Nevertheless, a TOF decrease was observed in the systems with single atoms; that was accounted for by declining of the hydrogen dissociation rate or its slower spillover. Isotope-kinetic data were used for determining quantitatively undesirable contributions to the process selectivity caused by both hydrogenation of acetylene and gas-phase ethylene to ethane. High selectivities of alloyed bimetallic systems comprising isolated palladium atoms at approaching to the complete conversion of acetylene were caused by the low rate of hydrogenation of weakly adsorbed ethylene to ethane while for Pd/GF catalysts by the complete exclusion of the hydrogenation of ethylene from gas-phase.

The process of hydrotreatment of diesel fuel (fraction 180–320 °C) over fresh and spent (after two-year operation in an industrial reactor) Co-Mo catalyst was studied. It was established that the sulfur contents were rather close to one another in the diesel fuel samples treated using the fresh and spent catalysts, even though the specific surface area was 40 % smaller in the spent catalyst compared to that in the fresh sample. Dependence of effective constant keff of hydrodesulfurization on the temperature of low-temperature hydrotreatment (below 320–330 °C) was characteristic of the kinetic range of heterogeneous catalysis complicated by external diffusion resistance. When the temperature was elevated up to 420 °C, the process of diesel hydrotreatment transferred to the external diffusion region. Activation energies of hydrodesulfurization were comparable over the spent and fresh catalysts (81.1 and 80.5 kJ/mol, respectively). A hypothesis of the specific catalyst deactivation was discussed.

A series of thermostable heat-conducting selective catalysts for air conversion of lower alkanes to burn-initiating fuel additives fed as synthesis gas to fuel were developed based on nickel-containing highly porous foam-cellulous material (HPCM) and a net-shaped support. The catalyst synthesis included stages of preparation of the support based on Ni-HPCM (Ni 99,95 %, PPI = 40) or fechral grid, arrangement of the support surface and formation of structured units, thermal treatment of the samples, supporting of the active component via repeated impregnation with a combination of magnesium and nickel acetates, and stepwise thermal treatment. Thus prepared catalysts NiO-MgO/(HPCM or fechral) were tested in the reactions of air conversion of propane, propane-butane, natural gas, as well as tri-reforming. In all the 80–100 hour experiments, the catalysts provided 90–96 % conversion at the flow rate of 32000–71000 h^–1, no coke formation being observed at the air excess coefficient of 0.31–0.43. A two-phase two-temperature mathematical model of the air conversion of liquefied hydrocarbon gases (LHG) was developed for the numerical analysis of the results obtained; the modeled results agreed well with the experimental data on temperatures of the catalyst and flow, as well as on the composition of the outlet gas mixture. A generator of 100 kW heat power for the air conversion of LHG was calculated as a practical example.

The necessity of deep conversion of heavy oil gives rise to an increase in the production of hydrocarbon gases. The formed butanes are not always marketable. In the paper, the possibility of the production of high-octane oxygenate mixture via oxidation of the industrial isobutene fraction is discussed. The reaction was conducted in the absence and in the presence of catalysts such as Au/Silicalite-1 and Cu/SiO₂. The factors were studied that allowed the formation of undesirable impurities (hydroperoxides, peroxides, acids) to be minimized. The target product was tert-butyl alcohol (TBA); it was produced at the selectivity of 64–69 % at the butane conversion of 55–69 %. RON number of TBA is 113. Along with TBA, alcohols and ketones with RON 106–115 were produced. The best result was obtained with the Cu/SiO₂; in the presence of this catalyst the yield of TBA was 18 % higher and the yield of ketones was as high as 2.9 times of the yields obtained by the noncatalytic reaction. The total yield of products to be used as high-octane reached 40 g/L·h, while RON was ca. 111 of this mixture. The mixture of TBA-based oxygenates are less volatile than methyl-tert-butyl alcohol that is of particular importance to provide gasoline stability in summertime.

Physicochemical properties of the spent industrial catalyst Co-Mo/Al₂O₃ for hydrotreatment of diesel fuel were studied. IR, TG, DTA and SEM techniques were used to establish that the catalyst surface is covered uniformly by a coke film; the soft coke consists predominantly of a mixture of slightly branched saturated hydrocarbons. Coke is oxidized at 190–375 °C (soft coke) and 375–525 °C (hard coke) and was removed quantitatively by calcining in air at 550 °C for 3 hours. XRD and SEM techniques, low temperature nitrogen adsorption, and chemical analysis were used to demonstrate considerable changes in the structure of the spent catalyst (phases Co₃O₄, CoCO₃ and CoSO₄·6H₂O); the Mo content decreased by 7.7 %; Fe, Na and V impurities were accumulated; sintering resulted in a decrease in the specific surface area and total pore volume by 31.5 and 28.4 %, respectively. The data obtained are necessary for developing methods for the catalyst utilization.

The reported data relate to the influence of the nature of the aluminosilica support and of the temperature of its treatment with the ammoniaccarbonate solution containing ammoniac-carbonate complex of copper on the specific surface area, chemical and phase composition of the precursor of the active component and on the properties of copper-containing catalyst for dedhydrogenation of cyclohexanol. Elevation of the treatment temperature of amorphous silica (white carbon) with the ammoniac-carbonate solution results in an increase in the proportion of the chemically anchored precursor up to its complete bonding to the support to form the immobilized phase. A higher thermostability of the catalyst supported on white carbon with boehmite compared to the catalysts supported on pyrogenous silica is demonstrated.

The influence of negatively polar plasma of crown discharge on the rate of photocatalytic oxidation (PCO) of vapors of acetone and benzene was investigated by studying dynamics of changes in the composition of gas-air mixture in a 404 L reactor using in-situ IR spectroscopy. Titanium (Hombifine N) was used as the photocatalyst; it was lighted with a UV-lamp at the wavelength λ = 365 nm. The rate of the photocatalytic oxidation of the substrate vapor was compared to the oxidation rate in crown discharge plasma, to the rate of dark oxidation with ozone (side product of the discharge burning), to the rate of photocatalytic oxidation in the presence of ozone, as well as to the rate of the photocatalytic oxidation under medium treatment with the crown discharge plasma. The rate of oxidation of various substrates was shown to be much lower in individual plasma and in ozone-containing atmosphere than in photocatalytic oxidation but application of the crown discharge led to an increase in the rate of photocatalytic oxidation and in the rate of oxidation in ozone-containing atmosphere. Under the action of the discharge, ozone was not accumulated in considerable proportion in the gas mixture but after consumption of 80–90 % of the oxidized substrate. The order of acetone PCO with respect to ozone was determined. It was shown that the action of plasma allowed benzene PCO to be noticeably accelerated due to considerable depression of the photocatalyst deactivation compared to that during individual PCO of benzene.

A gene of thermostable esterase of bacteria Ureibacillus thermosphaericus was expressed in strain E. coli BL21(DE3) comprised in domain TrxA-containing genetic construct pET32b-estUT1, under the control T7-promoter. The specific activity and relative thermostability of thus produced recombinant enzyme increased from 54.2 to 65.8 % (an hour incubation at 70 °C). The additional domain TrxA was discovered not to affect noticeably the pH optimum of the enzyme activity and its substrate specificity. In the absence of domain TrxA, the stability of estUT1 increased considerably in the presence of various chemicals including ethanol and methanol. The maximal catalytic activity (k_cat/KM) of esterase equal to 280.0 s^–1·mM^–1 was observed in the absence of domain TrxA. Thus, introduction of an additional processed domain TrxA allows the enzyme to be secreted in the dissolved form but, on the other hand, the target protein becomes less thermostable.