17.7 Catalysis

Catalysts Do Not Affect Equilibrium

A catalyst can speed up the rate of a reaction. Though this increase in reaction rate may cause a system to reach equilibrium more quickly (by speeding up the forward and reverse reactions), a catalyst has no effect on the value of an equilibrium constant nor on equilibrium concentrations.

The interplay of changes in concentration or pressure, temperature, and the lack of an influence of a catalyst on a chemical equilibrium is illustrated in the industrial synthesis of ammonia from nitrogen and hydrogen according to the equation

A large quantity of ammonia is manufactured by this reaction. Each year, ammonia is among the top 10 chemicals, by mass, manufactured in the world. About 2 billion pounds are manufactured in the United States each year.

Ammonia plays a vital role in our global economy. It is used in the production of fertilizers and is, itself, an important fertilizer for the growth of corn, cotton, and other crops. Large quantities of ammonia are converted to nitric acid, which plays an important role in the production of fertilizers, explosives, plastics, dyes, and fibers, and is also used in the steel industry.

Portrait of a Chemist

Fritz Haber

In the early 20th century, German chemist Fritz Haber (Figure 17.22) developed a practical process for converting diatomic nitrogen, which cannot be used by plants as a nutrient, to ammonia, a form of nitrogen that is easiest for plants to absorb.

$${\text{N}}_2(g)+3{\text{H}}_2(g)\rightleftharpoons 2{\text{NH}}_3(g)$$

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The availability of nitrogen is a strong limiting factor to the growth of plants. Despite accounting for 78% of air, diatomic nitrogen (N₂) is nutritionally unavailable due the tremendous stability of the nitrogen-nitrogen triple bond. For plants to use atmospheric nitrogen, the nitrogen must be converted to a more bioavailable form (this conversion is called nitrogen fixation).

Haber was born in Breslau, Prussia (presently Wroclaw, Poland) in December 1868. He went on to study chemistry and, while at the University of Karlsruhe, he developed what would later be known as the Haber process: the catalytic formation of ammonia from hydrogen and atmospheric nitrogen under high temperatures and pressures. For this work, Haber was awarded the 1918 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for synthesis of ammonia from its elements. The Haber process was a boon to agriculture, as it allowed the production of fertilizers to no longer be dependent on mined feed stocks such as sodium nitrate. Currently, the annual production of synthetic nitrogen fertilizers exceeds 100 million tons and synthetic fertilizer production has increased the number of humans that arable land can support from 1.9 persons per hectare in 1908 to 4.3 in 2008.

Figure 17.22 The work of Nobel Prize recipient Fritz Haber revolutionized agricultural practices in the early 20th century. His work also affected wartime strategies, adding chemical weapons to the artillery.

In addition to his work in ammonia production, Haber is also remembered by history as one of the fathers of chemical warfare. During World War I, he played a major role in the development of poisonous gases used for trench warfare. Regarding his role in these developments, Haber said, “During peace time a scientist belongs to the World, but during war time he belongs to his country.”¹ Haber defended the use of gas warfare against accusations that it was inhumane, saying that death was death, by whatever means it was inflicted. He stands as an example of the ethical dilemmas that face scientists in times of war and the double-edged nature of the sword of science.

Like Haber, the products made from ammonia can be multifaceted. In addition to their value for agriculture, nitrogen compounds can also be used to achieve destructive ends. Ammonium nitrate has also been used in explosives, including improvised explosive devices. Ammonium nitrate was one of the components of the bomb used in the attack on the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in downtown Oklahoma City on April 19, 1995.

It has long been known that nitrogen and hydrogen react to form ammonia. However, it became possible to manufacture ammonia in useful quantities by the reaction of nitrogen and hydrogen only in the early 20th century after the factors that influence its equilibrium were understood.

To be practical, an industrial process must give a large yield of product relatively quickly. One way to increase the yield of ammonia is to increase the pressure on the system in which N₂, H₂, and NH₃ are at equilibrium or are coming to equilibrium.

The formation of additional amounts of ammonia reduces the total pressure exerted by the system and somewhat reduces the stress of the increased pressure.

Although increasing the pressure of a mixture of N₂, H₂, and NH₃ will increase the yield of ammonia, at low temperatures, the rate of formation of ammonia is slow. At room temperature, for example, the reaction is so slow that if we prepared a mixture of N₂ and H₂, no detectable amount of ammonia would form during our lifetime. The formation of ammonia from hydrogen and nitrogen is an exothermic process:

Thus, increasing the temperature to increase the rate lowers the yield. If we lower the temperature to shift the equilibrium to favor the formation of more ammonia, equilibrium is reached more slowly because of the large decrease of reaction rate with decreasing temperature.

Part of the rate of formation lost by operating at lower temperatures can be recovered by using a catalyst. The net effect of the catalyst on the reaction is to cause equilibrium to be reached more rapidly.

In the commercial production of ammonia, conditions of about 500 °C, 150–900 atm, and the presence of a catalyst are used to give the best compromise among rate, yield, and the cost of the equipment necessary to produce and contain high-pressure gases at high temperatures (Figure 17.23).

Figure 17.23 Commercial production of ammonia requires heavy equipment to handle the high temperatures and pressures required. This schematic outlines the design of an ammonia plant.

Catalysts function by providing an alternate reaction mechanism that has a lower activation energy than would be found in the absence of the catalyst. In some cases, the catalyzed mechanism may include additional steps, as depicted in the reaction diagrams shown in Figure 17.24. This lower activation energy results in an increase in rate as described by the Arrhenius equation. Note that a catalyst decreases the activation energy for both the forward and the reverse reactions and hence accelerates both the forward and the reverse reactions. Consequently, the presence of a catalyst will permit a system to reach equilibrium more quickly, but it has no effect on the position of the equilibrium as reflected in the value of its equilibrium constant (see the chapter on chemical equilibrium).

Figure 17.24 This potential energy diagram shows the effect of a catalyst on the activation energy. The catalyst provides a different reaction path with a lower activation energy. As shown, the catalyzed pathway involves a two-step mechanism (note the presence of two transition states) and an intermediate species (represented by the valley between the two transitions states).

Example 17.13

Using Reaction Diagrams to Compare Catalyzed Reactions

The two reaction diagrams here represent the same reaction: one without a catalyst and one with a catalyst. Identify which diagram suggests the presence of a catalyst, and determine the activation energy for the catalyzed reaction:

Solution

A catalyst does not affect the energy of reactant or product, so those aspects of the diagrams can be ignored; they are, as we would expect, identical in that respect. There is, however, a noticeable difference in the transition state, which is distinctly lower in diagram (b) than it is in (a). This indicates the use of a catalyst in diagram (b). The activation energy is the difference between the energy of the starting reagents and the transition state—a maximum on the reaction coordinate diagram. The reagents are at 6 kJ and the transition state is at 20 kJ, so the activation energy can be calculated as follows:

$$E_{\text{a}}=20\text{kJ}-6\text{kJ}=14\text{kJ}$$

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Check Your Learning

Determine which of the two diagrams here (both for the same reaction) involves a catalyst, and identify the activation energy for the catalyzed reaction:

Answer:

Diagram (b) is a catalyzed reaction with an activation energy of about 70 kJ.

Homogeneous Catalysts

A homogeneous catalyst is present in the same phase as the reactants. It interacts with a reactant to form an intermediate substance, which then decomposes or reacts with another reactant in one or more steps to regenerate the original catalyst and form product.

As an important illustration of homogeneous catalysis, consider the earth’s ozone layer. Ozone in the upper atmosphere, which protects the earth from ultraviolet radiation, is formed when oxygen molecules absorb ultraviolet light and undergo the reaction:

Ozone is a relatively unstable molecule that decomposes to yield diatomic oxygen by the reverse of this equation. This decomposition reaction is consistent with the following mechanism:

The presence of nitric oxide, NO, influences the rate of decomposition of ozone. Nitric oxide acts as a catalyst in the following mechanism:

The overall chemical change for the catalyzed mechanism is the same as:

The nitric oxide reacts and is regenerated in these reactions. It is not permanently used up; thus, it acts as a catalyst. The rate of decomposition of ozone is greater in the presence of nitric oxide because of the catalytic activity of NO. Certain compounds that contain chlorine also catalyze the decomposition of ozone.

Portrait of a Chemist

Mario J. Molina

The 1995 Nobel Prize in Chemistry was shared by Paul J. Crutzen, Mario J. Molina (Figure 17.25), and F. Sherwood Rowland “for their work in atmospheric chemistry, particularly concerning the formation and decomposition of ozone.”² Molina, a Mexican citizen, carried out the majority of his work at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

Figure 17.25 (a) Mexican chemist Mario Molina (1943 –) shared the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1995 for his research on (b) the Antarctic ozone hole. (credit a: courtesy of Mario Molina; credit b: modification of work by NASA)

In 1974, Molina and Rowland published a paper in the journal Nature (one of the major peer-reviewed publications in the field of science) detailing the threat of chlorofluorocarbon gases to the stability of the ozone layer in earth’s upper atmosphere. The ozone layer protects earth from solar radiation by absorbing ultraviolet light. As chemical reactions deplete the amount of ozone in the upper atmosphere, a measurable “hole” forms above Antarctica, and an increase in the amount of solar ultraviolet radiation— strongly linked to the prevalence of skin cancers—reaches earth’s surface. The work of Molina and Rowland was instrumental in the adoption of the Montreal Protocol, an international treaty signed in 1987 that successfully began phasing out production of chemicals linked to ozone destruction.

Molina and Rowland demonstrated that chlorine atoms from human-made chemicals can catalyze ozone destruction in a process similar to that by which NO accelerates the depletion of ozone. Chlorine atoms are generated when chlorocarbons or chlorofluorocarbons—once widely used as refrigerants and propellants—are photochemically decomposed by ultraviolet light or react with hydroxyl radicals. A sample mechanism is shown here using methyl chloride:

$${\text{CH}}_3\text{Cl}+\text{OH}⟶\text{Cl}+\text{other products}$$

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Chlorine radicals break down ozone and are regenerated by the following catalytic cycle:

$$\begin{array}{}\\ \text{Cl}+{\text{O}}_3⟶\text{ClO}+{\text{O}}_2\\ \text{ClO}+\text{O}⟶\text{Cl}+{\text{O}}_2\\ \text{overall Reaction:}{\text{O}}_3+\text{O}⟶2{\text{O}}_2\end{array}$$

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A single monatomic chlorine can break down thousands of ozone molecules. Luckily, the majority of atmospheric chlorine exists as the catalytically inactive forms Cl₂ and ClONO₂.

Since receiving his portion of the Nobel Prize, Molina has continued his work in atmospheric chemistry at MIT.

How Sciences Interconnect

Glucose-6-Phosphate Dehydrogenase Deficiency

Enzymes in the human body act as catalysts for important chemical reactions in cellular metabolism. As such, a deficiency of a particular enzyme can translate to a life-threatening disease. G6PD (glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase) deficiency, a genetic condition that results in a shortage of the enzyme glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase, is the most common enzyme deficiency in humans. This enzyme, shown in Figure 17.26, is the rate-limiting enzyme for the metabolic pathway that supplies NADPH to cells (Figure 17.27).

Figure 17.26 Glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase is a rate-limiting enzyme for the metabolic pathway that supplies NADPH to cells.

A disruption in this pathway can lead to reduced glutathione in red blood cells; once all glutathione is consumed, enzymes and other proteins such as hemoglobin are susceptible to damage. For example, hemoglobin can be metabolized to bilirubin, which leads to jaundice, a condition that can become severe. People who suffer from G6PD deficiency must avoid certain foods and medicines containing chemicals that can trigger damage their glutathione-deficient red blood cells.

Figure 17.27 In the mechanism for the pentose phosphate pathway, G6PD catalyzes the reaction that regulates NADPH, a co-enzyme that regulates glutathione, an antioxidant that protects red blood cells and other cells from oxidative damage.

Heterogeneous Catalysts

A heterogeneous catalyst is a catalyst that is present in a different phase (usually a solid) than the reactants. Such catalysts generally function by furnishing an active surface upon which a reaction can occur. Gas and liquid phase reactions catalyzed by heterogeneous catalysts occur on the surface of the catalyst rather than within the gas or liquid phase.

Heterogeneous catalysis has at least four steps:

1. Adsorption of the reactant onto the surface of the catalyst
2. Activation of the adsorbed reactant
3. Reaction of the adsorbed reactant
4. Diffusion of the product from the surface into the gas or liquid phase (desorption).

Any one of these steps may be slow and thus may serve as the rate determining step. In general, however, in the presence of the catalyst, the overall rate of the reaction is faster than it would be if the reactants were in the gas or liquid phase.

Figure 17.28 illustrates the steps that chemists believe to occur in the reaction of compounds containing a carbon–carbon double bond with hydrogen on a nickel catalyst. Nickel is the catalyst used in the hydrogenation of polyunsaturated fats and oils (which contain several carbon–carbon double bonds) to produce saturated fats and oils (which contain only carbon–carbon single bonds).

Figure 17.28 There are four steps in the catalysis of the reaction ${\text{C}}_2{\text{H}}_4+{\text{H}}_2⟶{\text{C}}_2{\text{H}}_6$ by nickel. (a) Hydrogen is adsorbed on the surface, breaking the H–H bonds and forming Ni–H bonds. (b) Ethylene is adsorbed on the surface, breaking the π-bond and forming Ni–C bonds. (c) Atoms diffuse across the surface and form new C–H bonds when they collide. (d) C₂H₆ molecules escape from the nickel surface, since they are not strongly attracted to nickel.

Other significant industrial processes that involve the use of heterogeneous catalysts include the preparation of sulfuric acid, the preparation of ammonia, the oxidation of ammonia to nitric acid, and the synthesis of methanol, CH₃OH. Heterogeneous catalysts are also used in the catalytic converters found on most gasoline-powered automobiles (Figure 17.29).

Chemistry in Everyday Life

Automobile Catalytic Converters

Scientists developed catalytic converters to reduce the amount of toxic emissions produced by burning gasoline in internal combustion engines. Catalytic converters take advantage of all five factors that affect the speed of chemical reactions to ensure that exhaust emissions are as safe as possible.

By utilizing a carefully selected blend of catalytically active metals, it is possible to effect complete combustion of all carbon-containing compounds to carbon dioxide while also reducing the output of nitrogen oxides. This is particularly impressive when we consider that one step involves adding more oxygen to the molecule and the other involves removing the oxygen (Figure 17.29).

Figure 17.29 A catalytic converter allows for the combustion of all carbon-containing compounds to carbon dioxide, while at the same time reducing the output of nitrogen oxide and other pollutants in emissions from gasoline-burning engines.

Most modern, three-way catalytic converters possess a surface impregnated with a platinum-rhodium catalyst, which catalyzes the conversion of nitric oxide into dinitrogen and oxygen as well as the conversion of carbon monoxide and hydrocarbons such as octane into carbon dioxide and water vapor:

$$\begin{array}{l}2{\text{NO}}_{\text{2}}(g)⟶{\text{N}}_{\text{2}}(g)+2{\text{O}}_{\text{2}}(g)\\ 2\text{CO(}g)+{\text{O}}_2(g)⟶2{\text{CO}}_{\text{2}}(g)\\ 2{\text{C}}_8{\text{H}}_{18}(g)+25{\text{O}}_2(g)⟶16{\text{CO}}_2(g)+18{\text{H}}_2\text{O}(g)\end{array}$$

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In order to be as efficient as possible, most catalytic converters are preheated by an electric heater. This ensures that the metals in the catalyst are fully active even before the automobile exhaust is hot enough to maintain appropriate reaction temperatures.

Link to Learning

The University of California at Davis’ “ChemWiki” provides a thorough explanation of how catalytic converters work.

How Sciences Interconnect

Enzyme Structure and Function

The study of enzymes is an important interconnection between biology and chemistry. Enzymes are usually proteins (polypeptides) that help to control the rate of chemical reactions between biologically important compounds, particularly those that are involved in cellular metabolism. Different classes of enzymes perform a variety of functions, as shown in Table 17.3.

Classes of Enzymes and Their Functions
Class	Function
oxidoreductases	redox reactions
transferases	transfer of functional groups
hydrolases	hydrolysis reactions
lyases	group elimination to form double bonds
isomerases	isomerization
ligases	bond formation with ATP hydrolysis

Table 17.3

Enzyme molecules possess an active site, a part of the molecule with a shape that allows it to bond to a specific substrate (a reactant molecule), forming an enzyme-substrate complex as a reaction intermediate. There are two models that attempt to explain how this active site works. The most simplistic model is referred to as the lock-and-key hypothesis, which suggests that the molecular shapes of the active site and substrate are complementary, fitting together like a key in a lock. The induced fit hypothesis, on the other hand, suggests that the enzyme molecule is flexible and changes shape to accommodate a bond with the substrate. This is not to suggest that an enzyme’s active site is completely malleable, however. Both the lock-and-key model and the induced fit model account for the fact that enzymes can only bind with specific substrates, since in general a particular enzyme only catalyzes a particular reaction (Figure 17.30).

Figure 17.30 (a) According to the lock-and-key model, the shape of an enzyme’s active site is a perfect fit for the substrate. (b) According to the induced fit model, the active site is somewhat flexible, and can change shape in order to bond with the substrate.

Link to Learning

The Royal Society of Chemistry provides an excellent introduction to enzymes for students and teachers.

The connection between the rate of a reaction and its equilibrium constant is one we can easily determine with just a bit of algebraic substitution. For a reaction where substance A forms B (and the reverse)

The rate of the forward reaction is

And the rate of the reverse reaction is

Once equilibrium is established, the rates of the forward and reverse reactions are equal:

Rearranging a bit, we get

Also recall that the equilibrium constant is simply the ratio of product to reactant concentration at equilibrium:

So the equilibrium constant turns out to be the ratio of the forward to the reverse rate constants. This relationship also helps cement our understanding of the nature of a catalyst. That is, a catalyst does not change the fundamental equilibrium (or the underlying thermodynamics) of a reaction. Rather, what it does is alter the rate constant for the reaction – that is, both rate constants, forward and reverse, equally. In doing so, catalysts usually speed up the rate at which reactions attain equilibrium (though they can be used to slow down the rate of reaction as well!).