New approaches to rate enhancement in heterogeneous catalysis

Rate enhancement, or promotion, of heterogeneous catalysts has long been viewed as an empirical subject, and many catalysts have been designed on the basis of large catalyst screening programmes. This paper addresses recent advances in this topic and indicates that much progress is being made on the basis of a molecular approach, in contrast to the previous empirical methodology, and in particular highly effective enantioselective heterogeneous catalysts can be designed. Two catalyst systems are selected for detailed discussion, namely enantioselective hydrogenation using cinchona-modified platinum catalysts and the modification of zeolites with chiral molecules.