Professor Thomas Maschmeyer

Professor Thomas Maschmeyer, Federation Fellow and Professor of Chemistry, thinks "green". Much of his work is aimed at producing chemicals in the bulk chemicals, intermediates and pharmaceuticals industries more sustainably, using new fundamental insights on the molecular and nanoscopic level.

Professor Maschmeyer's work has focused on increasing the reaction as well as the reactor efficiency; increasing speed, selectivity, stability as well as minimising energy use and generation of unwanted by-products. He targets problems that have a global dimension. For example, he has devised ceramic membrane reactors that allow conversion and separation in the petrochemicals industry to occur simultaneously, thereby potentially reducing plant size by more than 60%, whilst gaining improvements in product quality and energy use - large scale pilot studies are currently underway. He has also been involved in the development of several high-performance industrial catalysts that are soon to be up-scaled to multi-tonnage levels. Furthermore, he played a founding role in Avantium, a Dutch start-up company specialising in high-throughput experimentation (involving robots and automation) that employs close to 100 people and services a wide variety of chemical research needs worldwide. He has brought some of this technology with him, making his laboratories unique in the Southern Hemisphere.

His current work includes, but is not limited to, studies into how to replace batch processes with continuous flow processes using heterogeneous (or immobilised homogeneous) catalysts and enzymes. He also concerns himself with the depletion of fossil-based energy sources and is studying the conversion of bio-mass to bio-fuels, e.g. producing a light crude oil equivalent from sugarcane waste, and the generation of hydrogen from renewable resources (e.g. from biomass or from water and sunlight).

Professor Maschmeyer believes that the world is standing at the technological threshold of an industrial revolution that is driven by the need for hydrogen as an energy carrier and the need for truly sustainable (industrial) processes. His research strategies help to ensure that Australia is at the forefront of this revolution.