“This is a significant breakthrough for converting alkanes into useful building blocks for medicines and materials for other industries,” says Noël. “Our approach allows for the immediate use of alkanes for more complex molecules without many unwanted by-products, while at the same time decreasing pollution and simplifying the activation process.”                                           

To realize this new process, the researchers had to contend with two main issues. First, they needed a method that could easily sunder or break C-H bonds with a bond dissociation energy (BDE) between 96.5 and 105 kcal mol^-1. The C-H bonds in methane are the most difficult to break. Second, the handling of gaseous alkanes requires tailor-made technologies that can bring the alkanes in close contact with a catalyst in a carefully monitored reaction environment. The researchers solved both of these issues by exciting the alkanes with UV light (about 365 nm) in the presence of a suitable catalyst at room temperature.

“The catalyst used is decatungstate. When illuminated, the catalyst becomes highly energetic and then has sufficient energy to split C-H bonds. We find that this works for methane, ethane, propane, and isobutane,” says Noël. He adds: “Our new approach is faster than traditional approaches, and we are excited to see how it develops. This study has employed microreactors given that they facilitate greater control over the reaction conditions, better confinement of the gaseous raw materials, and easier illumination of the catalyst. In the future, we will consider reactors that can allow higher production capacities.” This new method paves the way for the cheaper production of some medicines given that the cost of activating the gases for their production would be lower.