Catalytic Materials by 3D Printing: A Mini Review

Abstract

Catalytic processes are the dominant driving force in the chemical industry, proper design and fabrication of three-dimensional (3D) catalysts monoliths helps to keep the active species from scattering in the reaction flow, improve high mass loading, expose abundant active catalytic sites and even realize turbulent gas flow, greatly improving the catalytic performance. Three-dimensional printing technology, also known as additive manufacturing, provides free design and accurate fabrication of complex 3D structures in an efficient and economic way. This disruptive technology brings light to optimizing and promoting the development of existing catalysts. In this mini review, we firstly introduce various printing techniques which are applicable for fabricating catalysts. Then, the recent developments in 3D printing catalysts are scrutinized. Finally, challenges and possible research directions in this field are proposed, with the expectation of providing guidance for the promotion of 3D printed catalysts.

Industry 4.0 and Chemical Industry: The Technology Enablers behind Strategic Growth of Chemical Companies

“…3) Applications Of 3D Printing In Chemical Industry 4.0a) 3D Printing for Catalysts: Catalytic processes are the dominant driving force in the chemical industry. Proper design and fabrication of three-dimensional (3D) catalyst monoliths help to keep the active species from scattering in the reaction flow, improve high mass loading, expose abundant active catalytic sites and even realise turbulent gas flow, significantly improving the catalytic performance [13]. Additive manufacturing plays an essential role in the recent development and optimisation of existing catalysts through active fabrication techniques.…”

“…The 3D-printed structure with zigzag channels exhibited improved activity and higher stability than a conventionally fabricated monolith with parallel channels. d) 3D Printing of Porous Supports Followed by Post Loading: To complement the limitation of the direct printing of monolithic catalysts, mainly caused by the negative influence of necessary additives and solvents during the ink's preparation, loading of active catalysts onto 3D porous supports has been proven to be an effective strategy [13]. To achieve a high energy density of energy storage and conversion devices, thick electrodes with high activity are expected.…”

“…Threedimensional printing technology allows the construction of electrodes with high mass loading and thoroughly exposes active sites by structure design. Hu's group demonstrated the realisation of thick electrodes with high catalytic activity for Li-CO 2 batteries by 3D printing technology [13,14] e) 3d printing for Electrochemistry: Electrochemistry can undoubtedly benefit from using 3D-printing technologies because they facilitate the construction of custom-made complex measurement systems at reduced prices and with great versatility [15].  Direct 3D printing of carbon-based conductive materials has recently been demonstrated using graphene composites.…”

3D-Printed Cyclodextrin Polymer Encapsulated Wells–Dawson: A Novel Catalyst for Knoevenagel Condensation Reactions

“…The classification of 3D printing encompasses material extrusion-based, vat photopolymerization-based, and powder-based techniques, each category comprising various established methods . Notably, digital light processing (DLP) stands out as a promising and straightforward approach for catalyst fabrication.…”

3D‐Printed Eosin Y‐Based Heterogeneous Photocatalyst for Organic Reactions

“…3D-printed objects were prepared for organometallic/ organocatalysts at their ground state. [29][30][31][32][33][34] In contrast, very few examples of photocatalysts on 3D-printed objects have been reported and they are mainly based on inorganic particle [35,36] or obtained by post-grafting. [37] Thus, a general approach to directly 3D-print a photocatalyst is currently missing.…”