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Molinaroli College of Engineering and Computing

Faculty and Staff

Wenqiang Yang

Title: Research Assistant Professor
Department: Chemical Engineering
Molinaroli College of Engineering and Computing
Email: wenqiang@email.sc.edu
Phone: 803-528-2991
Office: Swearingen Engineering Center
Room 2C14
301 Main Street
Columbia, SC 29208
Resources: Research Website
Google Scholar
My CV

Education

  • Ph.D., University of South Carolina, 2020
  • Master, University of Science and Technology of China, 2015
  • Diplom, Nanjing University of Science and Technology, 2012

Research Overview

Heterogeneous Catalysis over transition metal surfaces: Based on DFT calculations, this research focuses on studying and developing transition metal and metal alloy catalysts for chemical applications, including biomass, CO2 capture and conversion, and H2 storage. We aim to identify these metal catalysts' unique activity and selectivity for various reactions, understanding the reaction mechanisms and kinetics from an atomic level.

Machine learning in heterogeneous catalysis: Combined DFT, microkinetic modeling, and machine learning techniques are used to investigate the reaction kinetics of metal catalysts. The objective is to build a relationship between catalytic activity and selectivity and catalyst properties identified by machine learning. With the built relationship, a screening can be conducted for optimal catalysts for a specific chemical process and provide design suggestions for an experiment.


Selected Publications

  1. Wenqiang Yang, Zhenbin Wang, Jens K Nørskov, "CO Methanation over Ni–Fe Alloy Catalysts: An Inverse Design Problem", ACS Catalysis 14, 11657-11665, 2024.
  2. Wenqiang Yang, Kareem E Abdelfatah, Subrata Kumar Kundu, Biplab Rajbanshi, Gabriel A Terejanu, Andreas Heyden, "Machine Learning Accelerated First-Principles Study of the Hydrodeoxygenation of Propanoic Acid", ACS Catalysis 14, 10148-10163, 2024.
  3. Wenqiang Yang, Rajadurai Vijay Solomon, Jianmin Lu, Osman Mamun, Jesse Q Bond, Andreas Heyden, "Unraveling the mechanism of the hydrodeoxygenation of propionic acid over a Pt (1 1 1) surface in vapor and liquid phases", Journal of Catalysis, 381, 547-560, 2020.
  4. Kareem Abdelfatah, Wenqiang Yang, Rajadurai Vijay Solomon, Biplab Rajbanshi, Asif Chowdhury, Mehdi Zare, Subrata Kumar Kundu, Adam Yonge, Andreas Heyden, Gabriel Terejanu, "Prediction of transition-state energies of hydrodeoxygenation reactions on transition-metal surfaces based on machine learning", J. Phys. Chem. C, 123, 49, 29804–29810, 2019.
  5. Asif J Chowdhury, Wenqiang Yang, Eric Walker, Osman Mamun, Andreas Heyden, Gabriel A Terejanu, "Prediction of adsorption energies for chemical species on metal catalyst surfaces using machine learning", J. Phys. Chem. C, 122, 49, 28142–28150, 2018.

Challenge the conventional. Create the exceptional. No Limits.

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