(Lecture, Jan 4) Rational Design of Structured Reactors and Materials for Catalysis
Title: Rational Design of Structured Reactors and Materials for Catalysis
Speaker: Dr. Xiaolei Fan (The University of Manchester)
Time: 10:00a.m., Jan. 4th, 2017
Venue: Room 214, Building No. 16, Wushan Campus

Brief introduction to Dr. Xiaolei Fan:
Dr. Fan received his BEng (Environmental Engineering) and MRes (Chemical Engineering) in China. In 2006, he joined the Department of Chemical Engineering at the University of Bath, UK, as a PhD candidate under the supervision of Prof. Alexei A. Lapkin. His PhD projects focused on designing structured multifunctional reactors, formulating novel carbon-based metal catalysts for continuous-flow heterogeneous catalysis and developing flow chemistry with microreactors. After his PhD, from May 2010 to September 2013, Xiaolei worked as a post-doctoral research fellow at the University of Warwick and then at the University of Cambridge. During this period, He was contracted by EC FP7 projects to develop nanomaterial-based catalysts (e.g. bi-metallic catalysts supported on monoliths coated with nanocarbons) and perform multi-scale modeling (CFD + kinetic modeling) of catalytic multiphase flows in structured reactors. In October 2013, he joined the School of Chemical Engineering and Analytical Science at The University of Manchester as a Lecturer in Chemical Engineering. He has a research group with 6 PhD students and one PDRA with research projects focusing on (i) porous materials for gas separation and catalysis, (ii) hierarchical structures based on macroscopic cellular materials for continuous-flow catalysis, (iii) non-conventional activation of catalysts and (iv) simulation of reacting flows in porous media.
In this seminar, he will present his current research related to structured catalysts and reactors. A brief introduction to the Chemical Engineering education and research in the UK as well as at the University of Manchester will also be given.