Dr. Weifeng Tu
Associate Professor, Ph.D. in Chem. Eng.
Dr. Weifeng Tu joined Zhengzhou University in 2016. He received his PhD from Chongqing University 2013. He worked as a postdoctoral fellow at the Department of Chemical Engineering & Applied Chemistry, University of Toronto, Canada (2014.01-2016.12, Prof. Ya-Huei Cathy Chin). Professor Tu is the inventor or co-inventor for 3 patents and patent applications, one book chapters, and 22 peer-reviewed publications.
Research Fields
Professor Tu’s research addresses the fundamental, molecular-scale understanding of heterogeneous catalysis. Specifically, his overarching goal is to understand heterogeneous catalytic science, deciphering the structures and dynamics of catalyst surfaces and connecting these surface events at the atomic scale to their macroscopic catalytic behavior for fuel processing, chemical synthesis, and emission control technologies. His work emphasizes the value and impact of rigorous, fundamental studies in industrial catalysis through atomistic descriptions of how molecules encounter active sites and their fate within the catalytic cycles. His core research strategy at the Zhengzhou University has focused on deciphering macroscopic reaction rates with kinetics, isotopic, chemical titration, and spectroscopic methods. Through these combined strategies, his team rationalizes kinetic phenomena in hydrogenation, deoxygenation, and oxidation reactions and then designs and synthesizes atomistically well-defined surfaces and materials, functionalized chemically to direct specific catalytic pathways, thus enabling individual chemical reactions to occur selectively.
His work, which focuses largely on quantitative kinetic treatments, synthesis, and spectroscopy, connects catalytic events to the dynamics of active sites and establishes the chemistry and reactivity trends. These concepts demonstrated in heterogeneous systems are general to any catalytic reaction. In fact, some of these concepts manifest across electrochemistry, homogeneous, and heterogeneous catalytic systems. He develops research methodologies to explore the fundamental principles of catalysis and then demonstrates their generality across several reaction systems and finally connects them to applications in other fields. The following are highlights of his recent work at the Zhengzhou University.
1. Catalytic consequences of surface reactive intermediates for H2O2 formation during H2-O2 reactions on metal clusters.
2. Periodic reactivity trends for the activation of alkanels on dispersed metal clusters.
3. Catalytic pathways for CO2 and CO activation during CO/CO2 hydrogenation on oxides.
Peer Reviewed Publication Articles
[1] Weifeng Tu, Mireille Ghoussoub, Chandra Veer Singh, and Ya-Huei (Cathy) Chin. Consequences of Surface Oxophilicity of Ni, Ni-Co, and Co Clusters on Methane Activation. Journal of the American Chemical Society, 2017, 139(20): 6928-6945.
[2] Weifeng Tu, Ya-Huei (Cathy) Chin. Catalytic Consequences of the Thermodynamic Activities at Metal Cluster Surfaces and their Periodic Reactivity Trend for Methanol Oxidation. Angewandte Chemie International Edition, 2014, 53: 12148-12152.
[3] Weifeng Tu, Ya-Huei (Cathy) Chin. Catalytic Consequences of the Identity and Coverages of Reactive Intermediates during Methanol Partial Oxidation on Pt Clusters. Journal of Catalysis, 2014, 313: 55-69.
[4] Weifeng Tu, Ya-Huei (Cathy) Chin. Catalytic Consequences of Chemisorbed Oxygen during Methanol Oxidative Dehydrogenation on Pd Clusters. ACS Catalysis, 2015, 5: 3375-3386.
[5] Weifeng Tu, Ya-Huei (Cathy) Chin. Connection of thermodynamic quantities with reactivity trends during catalytic oxidation of methanol on metal and metal-oxide clusters. ABSTRACTS OF PAPERS OF THE AMERICAN CHEMICAL SOCIETY, 2014, 248.
[6] Jane Howe, Ya-Huei (Cathy) Chin, Weifeng Tu, Yifei Yang, et al. Visualization of Phase Segregation and Surface Reconstruction of Pt-Based Bi-metallic Clusters During, In Situ, Oxidation. Microscopy & Microanalysis, 2016, 22(3):734-735.
[7] Ran Jingyu, Tu Weifeng, Yan Yunfei, Chen Bingbing. Numerical simulation on carbon deposition characteristics of mixture component on CH4/O2/H2O autothermal reforming reaction in a micro-chamber. Journal of engineering thermophysics, 2010, 31(8):1335-1338.
[8] Ran Jingyu, Tu Weifeng. Numerical Simulation on Carbon Deposition Characteristics of Humidity Ratio on CH4/wet Air Auto-thermal Reforming Reaction. Journal of engineering thermophysics, 2011, 31(2):345-348.
[9] Ran Jingyu, Tu Weifeng, Zhao Liujie. The effect of O2/CH4 ratio on the methane-wet air auto thermal reforming and carbon deposition in the micro-chamber. Journal of engineering thermophysics, 2011 32(6): 1069-1072.
Conferences
[1] Weifeng Tu. Periodic Reactivity Trends in Methane Activation on First-Row Transition Metal or Alloy Clusters. 25th North American Catalysis Society Meeting (NAM) in Denver, USA, Jun 4-9, 2017.
[2] Weifeng Tu. Catalytic Consequences of the Thermodynamic Activities of Oxygen at Metal Cluster Surfaces and Their Periodic Reactivity Trends for Selective Alkanol and Alkene Oxidation. Bio-Inspired Ideas for Sustainable Energy, Toronto, Canada (2014). (Poster)
[3] Weifeng Tu. Catalytic Consequences of Chemisorbed Oxygen during Methanol Partial Oxidation on Pt Clusters. 23rd North American Catalysis Society Meeting (NAM) in Louisville, Kentucky, USA, Jun 2-7,2013.
[4] Jingyu Ran, Weifeng Tu. The effect of oxygen to methane ratio on the methane-wet air autothermal reforming and carbon deposition in the micro-chamber[C]. Measuring Technology and Mechatronics Automation (ICMTMA), 2011 Third International Conference on. IEEE, 2011, 3: 789-792.
Contact Him
Dr. Weifeng Tu
Research center of hetergenous catalysis and engineering sciences
Zhengzhou University
100 Science Ave. Gaoxin District, Zhengzhou, Henan, 450001, China
Email: weifengtu@zzu.edu.cn