2019.     KUSAMA, T., AND YUKIO, U.  Thermal Decomposition of Methane.  Bull. Inst. Phys. Chem. Research, vol. 8, 1929, pp. 1-11; abs., vol. 2, p. 1; Chem. Abs., vol. 23, 1929, p. 1866.

        CH₄ has been pyrolyzed on several catalyzers:  (a) Pure Ni, (b) Ni+kieselguhr, (c) same as (b) but deprived of its activity by being used to reduce C₁₀H₈, and (d) reduced Fe:  (b) and (c) are equally suitable.  X-ray spectrograms show that C thus obtained is graphite, which was also proved by the graphitic acid method.  This graphite has catalytic properties, which are due to the presence of small amounts of Ni from the catalyzer.  By determining the S content of the catalyzer before and after a run, it was ascertained that natural gas contains a certain quantity of S but only a negligible amount.  HCl is better than HNO₃ to recover the catalyst, and a new catalyzer produced by the reduction of NiCl₂ is as active as one obtained from Ni(NO₃)₂.  H₂ obtained by the pyrolysis of CH₄ always contained some CH₄ that could not be removed, but the mixture can be used very satisfactorily to reduce C₁₀H₈.