ERI: Encapsulated Catalysts for Selective Hydrodeoxygenation of Lignin to Sustainable Aviation Fuel Blendstocks

Jet fuel helps move people and goods across long distances. A reliable affordable fuel supply is central to U.S. economic strength and national security. Sustainable aviation fuel made from domestic biomass can strengthen U.S. energy independence. It also can create high-value markets for U.S. farmers and rural industries. Current biomass-to-jet fuel pathways are costly because plant-based feedstocks are chemically diverse. This requires multiple catalytic steps and energy-intensive separations to convert the biomass to jet fuel. This project will address a key bottleneck in using lignin for jet fuel. Lignin is a plant-derived source of aromatic molecules. Lignin comes in a wide range of molecule sizes, but only the smaller molecules can be efficiently converted into key jet-fuel. The project will develop a catalyst strategy that reduces separation demands. The goal is to selectively upgrade smaller molecules without touching larger molecules. The research will help enable more practical and competitive domestic routes to jet-fuel blendstocks. It will also provide useful design rules for catalysts used in biomass upgrading. The project will train postdoctoral, graduate, and undergraduate researchers. It will also engage K–12 students through hands-on outreach activities that demonstrate selective catalysis using simple physical models. This project will develop porous catalysts that use nanoscale confinement to selectively upgrade smaller lignin-derived molecules while limiting reactions of larger species. Early process analysis, informed by cost drivers, will guide catalyst design toward separation bottlenecks that shape overall process practicality. The researchers will determine how micropore environment and acidity shape the structure and stability of encapsulated metal clusters across porous hosts with different pore window sizes. They will then quantify how confinement and metal–acid proximity govern size selectivity, reaction kinetics, and catalyst stability during catalytic deoxygenation of lignin-derived mixtures spanning smaller and larger species. By linking confinement-driven accessibility with active-site structure and kinetic behavior, the project will advance fundamental understanding of structure–function relationships in heterogeneous catalysis and will establish design principles for selective catalysis that can reduce separation demands in biomass upgrading, with broad relevance to chemical reaction engineering and surface chemistry. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria. NSF Award ID: 2552929 | Program: 01002627DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT | Principal Investigator: Jun Hee Jang | Institution: Rowan University, GLASSBORO, NJ | Award Amount: $199,999 View on NSF Award Search: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/show-award/?AWD_ID=2552929 View on Research.gov: https://www.research.gov/awardapi-service/v1/awards/2552929.html