The temperature scanning reactor I: Reactor types and modes of operation

Abstract

New analytical instruments and experimental techniques can have a profound influence on research methodology and effectiveness. At times, their introduction supports a step change in the rate of progress in a field of research; such radical innovations are usually preceded by a new theoretical insight, one which may require breaking with an established paradigm. Such a time appears to have come in the study of reaction kinetics, with the introduction of the temperature scanning (TS) methods and technology. The TS methodology makes it possible to perform kinetic experiments conveniently and rapidly, in fully-automated reactors, with software that simplifies data reduction to a point where temperature scanning reactors (TSRs) could become the first “kinetics instruments”. The TS technology has the potential to influence and change the way research is done in chemical kinetics, in much the same way that the advent of gas chromatography changed the ease and procedures of analysis. Temperature scanning methods, although new in kinetics research, have already been proven effective in other areas. They follow the lead of earlier transient operations, and of non-steady-state procedures, that are now well-established in thermal analysis (TA) and enzyme kinetics. The temperature scanning methods can be used to extract meaningful kinetic data from batch reactors (BRs), stream-swept reactors (SSRs), continuously-stirred tank reactors (CSTRs) and plug-flow reactors (PFRs). TS methods are broadly applicable to the study of chemical rate processes in all three phases of matter, with and without catalyst. They are applicable in all reactor configurations, because they deal with fundamental aspects of data-gathering, not with reactor-specific aspects of configuration or operation. Reactor-specific operating requirements, such as efficient mixing in the case of the CSTR, are no different in TS-CSTRs than they are in the corresponding conventional CSTR reactors. Conversion to the new TS technology is easy and rapid; TSRs are easy to operate and significantly more cost-effective than any of the research reactor types currently in use. Round-the-clock fully-automated TSR operation can provide R and D laboratories engaged in kinetic studies and/or catalyst development with unprecedented volumes of kinetic data, quickly and reliably. As the TS technology becomes widely available, research in reaction kinetics, reaction mechanisms and catalyst development should enter a period of renewal and rapid growth.