ALEXANDRIA, Va., July 30 -- United States Patent no. 12,371,802, issued on July 29, was assigned to Battelle Memorial Institute (Columbus, Ohio).

"Hollow-sphere Tin nanocatalysts for converting CO 2 into formate" was invented by Thuy Duong Nguyen Phan (Pittsburgh) and Douglas R. Kauffman (Pittsburgh).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "Three-dimensional (3D) hollow nanosphere electrocatalysts that convert CO2 into formate with high current density and Faradaic efficiency (FE). The SnO2 nanospheres were constructed from small, interconnected SnO2 nanocrystals. The size of the constituent SnO2 nanocrystals was controlled between 2-10 nm by varying the calcination temperature and observed a clear corr...