Found better ways to make fuels and chemicals from petroleum
Chemical engineer Tamotsu Imai of Mt. Prospect, Ill., will be honored on March 28 by the world's largest scientific society for developing more efficient ways to make petroleum-based chemicals and fuels. He will receive the American Chemical Society Award for Creative Invention at the Society's national meeting in San Francisco.
"The world population is growing further, and people need more materials and energy. So limited natural resources must be used in a more efficient way," said Imai, a chemical engineer with UOP LLC for 27 years before retiring in 1999.
Imai's focus at the technology-licensing company was catalysis. Like highly skilled construction workers, catalysts work in precise fashion under set conditions. But instead of buildings, they assemble new molecules.
"The catalyst can promote the desired reactions and control the wasteful materials. It can also save energy," Imai said. "Furthermore, the catalyst can improve the process safety and can make environmentally more friendly processes."
As director of UOP's Exploratory Skills Center, Imai worked on a variety of projects. In one, he and his group designed a safe, solid catalyst for making biode-gradable detergents. These products "are widely used in domestics and industries," he explained. "They use hydrofluoric acid as the catalyst in a large quantity for making an intermediate material for the detergents. Hydrofluoric acid is a very effective but dangerous and toxic liquid." Imai's catalyst eliminated the problem.
Imai also improved the process of making the molecules that serve as building blocks. One new catalyst increased by 20 percent the yield of a step in the production of styrene, which is in turn used to make plastics, resins and rubbers.
Stanley Gembicki, UOP vice president for research and development, wrote in his nomination letter, "It is key to note that not only does Dr. Imai invent ‹ he delivers technology to the marketplace."
Imai said he has been interested in science almost as long as he can recall. "I liked collecting rocks, fossils and insects like butterflies when I was in elementary school," he remembered. He first wanted to become a medical doctor, he added, but ultimately chose chemical engineering because he found mathematics and physics interesting as well.
The ACS Award for Creative Invention is sponsored by the ACS Committee on Corporation Associates.
A nonprofit organization with a membership of 161,000 chemists and chemical engineers, the American Chemical Society www.acs.org publishes scientific journals and databases, convenes major research conferences, and provides educational, science policy and career programs in chemistry. Its main offices are in Washington, D.C., and Columbus, Ohio.