A radical route from methane to methanol: The conversion of methane into chemicals usually proceeds through high-temperature routes that first form more reactive carbon monoxide and hydrogen. Agarwal et al. report a low-temperature (50°C) route in aqueous hydrogen peroxide (H ₂ O ₂ ) for oxidizing methane to methanol in high yield (92%). They used colloidal gold-palladium nanoparticles as a catalyst. The primary oxidant was O ₂ ; isotopic labeling showed that H ₂ O ₂ activated methane to methyl radicals, which subsequently incorporated O ₂ . Science , this issue p. 223

Direct hydrogen peroxide synthesis: Hydrogen peroxide is synthesized industrially without direct contact of hydrogen and oxygen in order to achieve high concentrations. For many applications, only dilute aqueous solutions are needed. Freakley et al. report an improvement in the direct synthesis of hydrogen peroxide over using palladium-tin alloys. This catalyst still achieves selectivities of >95%, like palladium-gold alloys, but is cheaper and can suppress reactions that decompose the product. Science , this issue p. 965

Gold-on-carbon catalysts are analogs of homogeneous gold catalysts that use a redox couple of Au(I) and Au(III) species.

The ammoximation of cyclohexanone using preformed hydrogen peroxide (H ₂ O ₂ ) is currently applied commercially to produce cyclohexanone oxime, an important feedstock in nylon-6 production. We demonstrate that by using supported gold-palladium (AuPd) alloyed nanoparticles in conjunction with a titanium silicate-1 (TS-1) catalyst, H ₂ O ₂ can be generated in situ as needed, producing cyclohexanone oxime with >95% selectivity, comparable to the current industrial route. The ammoximation of several additional simple ketones is also demonstrated. Our approach eliminates the need to transport and store highly concentrated, stabilized H ₂ O ₂ , potentially achieving substantial environmental and economic savings. This approach could form the basis of an alternative route to numerous chemical transformations that are currently dependent on a combination of preformed H ₂ O ₂ and TS-1, while allowing for considerable process intensification.