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Latest issue of GCI Newsletter features Moti Herskowitz

“The extraordinary challenge in this field is to cross the Valley of Death… necessary for commercial implementation.”

This issue of the GCI newsletter features Moti Herskowitz, Director of the Blechner Center for industrial Catalysis and Process Development at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev.

Over the years your career focus has changed. What drove the change in focus? 

Catalysis and catalytic materials and processes have been at the forefront of science and technology for over 100 years, having an enormous impact on the modern life of human society. The needs have changed dramatically over the last century from production of basic products based on fossil feedstocks (coal, oil, natural gas) to overcoming major detrimental effects on the environment. Finding viable solutions to the air, water and land pollution created by modern society is one of the major challenges of the 21st century. It was natural to shift my interests to environmental catalysis, specifically dealing with renewable resources and products, based on carbon dioxide and water rather than fossil feedstocks.