Advantages And Disadvantages Of Chemocatalysis

The use of catalysts by mankind, dates back thousands of years, in processes such as wine- or bread-making. Their reaction scope is enormous and thus, they play an important role not only in natural processes, but in commercial processes as well. The latter include among others, the commercial production of chemicals, medicines and foods.

According to IUPAC, a catalyst is a substance that has the ability to increase the reaction rate, when added to a reaction, without itself getting consumed in the process. This can be usually achieved by reducing the activation energy or changing the reaction mechanism.

Traditionally, catalysis has been classified into two distinct categories: chemo- and bio-catalysis. Chemocatalysis is further divided into

Organometallic catalysts, for example, present wide substrate scopes and high productivity, thus they are often used in chemical manufacturing. However, their selectivity is poor, they present inability to function in aqueous solution and their reactions often require harsh conditions, such as high pressure. On the other hand, biocatalysts are widely used in pharmaceutical industry and green chemistry, due to their high selectivity. However, their main disadvantages include their low productivity and their inability to maintain high catalytic activity in organic solvents and high

Although initial attempts to construct ArMs were reported in the late 1970s, their construction was limited due to the tools available at that point. It was not until the early 2000’s, that researchers started to make serious efforts in exploiting ArMs. This resurgence of interest was mainly due to the significant progress in organometallic synthesis and protein engineering and due to the appreciation of the potential benefits of this technology. Since then, several efforts in employing ArMs into various purposes have been