최민기 연구실

We design chemical architectures that enable molecules to move, react, and perform. Rather than focusing on a single material platform, we integrate structure, transport, active sites, and stability to create catalysts and adsorbents for energy, carbon management, and sustainable chemical processes. Our goal is to translate molecular-level understanding into practical technologies with meaningful environmental and societal impact. Climate change requires technologies that can efficiently capture CO₂ from dilute and concentrated sources and convert it into useful products. We design porous adsorbents and catalytic interfaces that control CO₂ accessibility, binding, transport, conversion, and regeneration. By connecting molecular-level design with scalable processes, our research aims to reduce carbon emissions and enable circular production of fuels and chemicals. Ammonia is essential for global food production and is emerging as a carbon-free energy carrier, yet its conventional production is highly energy- and carbon-intensive. We engineer metal–promoter interfaces and molecular reaction environments that facilitate nitrogen activation while controlling hydrogen transfer and catalyst poisoning. Our goal is to enable lower-temperature, lower-pressure ammonia synthesis compatible with renewable energy and distributed chemical manufacturing. Biomass and other renewable carbon sources can replace fossil resources, but their complex and bulky molecules are difficult to process selectively. We integrate hierarchical pores, transport pathways, and multifunctional active sites to control deoxygenation, hydrogenation, cracking, and isomerization. These chemical architectures provide pathways toward sustainable aviation fuel, renewable diesel, lubricant base oils, and high-value