ASTRAL - Advancing Sustainable Nanocatalysis through Asymmetric Single-Atom Platforms

FIS 3 Consolidator Grant awarded to Marco Di Giovannantonio

ASTRAL is a FIS 3 Consolidator Grant awarded to Marco Di Giovannantonio, researcher at CNR-ISM. It explores catalysis at its most fundamental level, where single atoms define chemical reactivity. By creating atomically precise platforms with deliberately asymmetric active sites, the project seeks to uncover how local structure and electronic imbalances control catalytic behavior. 

What happens when a single molecule meets a single atom? The ASTRAL project explores this fundamental question by studying catalysis with atomic precision, starting from the very first step: molecular sensing.

At the heart of the project are single-atom platforms – tailored nanostructures where isolated metal atoms act as individual, well-defined active sites. These systems allow scientists not only to drive chemical reactions, but first to observe how gas molecules interact with a single site: how they approach, bind, and are “sensed” at the atomic level.

“A central idea of ASTRAL is that asymmetry matters”, explains the Principal Investigator, Marco Di Giovannantonio (head of the ONSET Lab). “Unlike conventional catalysts with symmetric environments, these platforms are designed with deliberately asymmetric active sites. This subtle imbalance in structure and electronic distribution creates unique interaction patterns with molecules, influencing how they are detected, stabilized, and eventually activated”.

By combining advanced microscopy and spectroscopy techniques – capable of imaging and probing individual atoms and molecules – with theoretical modeling, ASTRAL directly connects atomic structure to function. This approach makes it possible to follow the entire pathway: from molecular sensing, to binding, to chemical transformation.

ASTRAL builds a fundamental understanding of the earliest stages of catalysis in model systems, by uncovering how asymmetric atomic environments control both molecular recognition and reactivity and laying the foundation for the development of next generation catalysts.