Newswise – A frog’s section doesn’t have much to do with catalysis, but an aspiring young scientist has to start somewhere.
A thoughtful Johannes Lercher described this frog experiment at school as his starting point in biology and chemistry. Both had to compete for career ambitions by writing. That, as well as tennis and skiing. He surpassed them all.
“I was always very diversified,” said Lercher.
Science won. Today the Battelle Fellow and director of the Institute for Integrated Catalysis at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) is considered one of the world’s leading experts in the field of catalysis, the art and science of accelerating chemical reactions. At the beginning of 2021, the German Catalysis Society awarded Lercher its highest award, recognizing his overall scientific work as well as his contributions to the development and understanding of solid catalysts made from raw materials. Later in 2021, Lercher was elected to the German Engineering Academy.
Center-bound energy sciences
Lercher is preparing to move to the recently inaugurated Energy Sciences Center along with other executives in PNNL’s catalysis community. The 140,000 square meter facility includes 52 laboratories, flexible collaboration rooms, conference rooms and offices for 250 employees and guest researchers. Designed to meet the Department of Energy’s high-performing, sustainable building standards, the facility features an energy and water-reducing design that utilizes plenty of natural light and utilizes waste heat energy generated by high-performance computers in an adjacent building.
Lercher said he looked forward to moving into the facility and noted that its design would help fuel advances in catalysis research by facilitating contact between scientists. The Energy Sciences Center includes research programs that are expected to develop advanced computational and data methods to accelerate scientific discoveries in chemistry and materials science. Potential research advances include the development of new catalysts to reduce vehicle emissions and the discovery of cheaper, safer, and better performing energy storage materials.
Lercher praised the coexistence of all these efforts in one room and pointed to a people-oriented benefit.
“I think the biggest and most important thing for the Energy Sciences Center, besides a good job, is that it should bring people together,” said Lercher. “I see it will help colleagues talk about science.”
Not such a high school
Lercher’s own scientific dialogue began at the Schottengymnasium in Vienna, Austria, which is considered one of the most renowned grammar schools in Austria. The alumni include three Nobel Prize winners. Today Lercher raves about his 12 years of training in the Benedictine prayer and work tradition as well as the lifelong friendships that resulted from it. The summers were a mixture of hiking and tennis in the Austrian countryside, where he developed tennis coaching skills and much later challenged PNNL colleagues to matches.
After graduating from the Schottengymnasium, he studied chemistry at the Vienna University of Technology. But he also spent two years in the theater, working in various roles.
“I had to find myself first,” says Lercher. “After graduating from high school, I thought about studying German with the aim of becoming a writer. But chemistry has always been an interest. And I’m practical. From the time I left high school, I wanted to be independent and I didn’t take any money from my parents. Did this influence my decision to study chemistry, which is more likely to ensure a good life? Possibly. “
He steamed through the Bachelor program at the University of Vienna and graduated in three years. In 1980 he received his PhD in chemistry. Both degrees were summa cum laude.
“I was lucky,” said Lercher.
Good luck and good
Its connection to catalysis came through an accidental introduction. In the middle of his doctorate in Vienna, he heard that a position as a research assistant was advertised at the Institute for Physical Chemistry. It was catalysis.
“It was interesting,” said Lercher. “And not just in the classroom, but also in the workplace, which is a much wilder environment. I was able to gain practical experience. So it was really a coincidence. If the institute had offered a position in spectroscopy, I would probably have been drawn to spectroscopy.
“But I was lucky again. Catalysis is a complex topic. It’s complex. Finding ways to speed up reactions is a fascinating task. You put a solid in a reactor and that reaction speeds up 10 times, 100 times. Then try to find out why this speeds up the response? How does it work? What happens when you change the parameters? “
After a postdoc at Yale University, he returned to the Vienna University of Technology as a university lecturer. From 1993 to 1998 he was professor of chemical engineering at the University of Twente in the Netherlands. In 1998 he accepted a professorship for technical chemistry at the Technical University of Munich, seat of the Research Institute for Catalysis. He lives in Munich with his wife and two cats. The couple has two grown children.
The once aspiring author is editor-in-chief of the Journal of Catalysis, a leading magazine in the field of catalysis. He is a member of the editorial boards of several catalysis journals. He was President of the International Zeolite Association and President of the European Federation of Catalysis Societies.
The PNNL path
Lercher started at PNNL in 2011. Two years earlier he had spoken to Bruce Garrett, then director of physical sciences at PNNL, and Doug Ray, then PNNL laboratory director, at a Department of Energy conference. Garrett and Ray searched for advice on who to hire as director of the Institute for Integrated Catalysis open-air opening. Lercher mentioned several names, but not his own.
The dialogue with Ray continued. They met in 2010 at a meeting of the American Chemical Society. Ray suggested that Lercher take over the reins, which he eventually did.
Roger Rousseau, a PNNL computer scientist and Lab Fellow, first met Lercher when he was interviewed for the director’s position.
“He’s an abstract thinker and thinks big,” said Rousseau. “And he thinks very holistically. In his opinion, science is about unraveling complex phenomena. He doesn’t just look at things from the atomic level, but from the atomic to the system level. “
Unrealistic positivism is negative
The opening of the Energy Sciences Center enables Lercher to work in close proximity to a researcher he personally recruited for the PNNL.
Oliver Gutierrez, who came to PNNL as a research assistant in 2017, studied as a postdoc at the Technical University of Munich from 2009. A Mexican professor who moderated Lercher in a seminar had introduced Gutierrez Lercher. Gutierrez led a catalysis research group that focused on industrial applications and alternative processes before arriving at PNNL. He had years to get to know Lercher.
“He’s strict,” said Gutierrez. “When you do research, it’s easy to get excited and think you’ve developed a super catalyst. John will bring you back to earth. He will ask questions. Why is this the case? Is that an experimental mistake? He defends himself against unrealistic positivism. This is how science works. He gave me a rigorous way of thinking, not just chemical but also scientific thinking. “
This is the lercher Zdenek Dohnalek knows. Dohnalek, chemist and PNNL Lab Fellow who has a joint calling with Washington State University, has been the laboratory’s Deputy Director of the Institute for Integrated Catalysis since 2013.
“Johannes is one of the few people I know who has a broad knowledge of catalysis, ranging from applied efforts to basic concepts,” said Dohnalek. “He has the rare ability to connect everything and make connections to other areas.”
Storage solutions at PNNL’s Energy Sciences Center
Lercher’s research deals with fundamental aspects of catalysts and catalyzed reactions that enable catalysis to lower the atmospheric carbon footprint through radically new approaches to the synthesis of energy sources. He wants to achieve this by catalyzing chemical conversions at significantly lower reaction temperatures and with a higher selectivity than is currently possible.
Lercher sees a decisive role in catalysis in the development of energy sources that do not contribute to the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
“We have to solve the problem worldwide and that is what we are striving for at PNNL,” said Lercher. “Catalysis is the key technology to solve this. We will harvest energy from the wind, we will harvest energy from the sun. In order to store and transport this energy, however, catalytic solutions are required. We want to solve such challenges in the new Energy Sciences Center. “
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