关键词: 甲醇, 同系化, 乙醇, 催化剂

Abstract: The methanol homologation is one of the promising technologies for ethanol production. Soluble salts of group-Ⅷ metals are generally used as catalysts，and iodine compounds as promoters. In this paper，catalysts are categorized according to the variety of active metal elements，and the mechanism of methanol homologation reaction is analyzed based on the former category. The reported work indicated that the low ethanol yield was the major restriction for the commercialization of this technology. Finally，the outlook for the future development of methanol homologation catalyst and further investigation of mechanism is provided in light of the current research status，regarding composite catalyst with multimetallic，catalyst modified with no halogen element，as well as low pressure-resistant catalysts.

Key words: methanol, ethanol, homologation, catalyst