Toyota Motor Corp. has developed an exhaust-purifying catalyst that reduced precious metal use by 20% to reduce air pollution that will be installed in a Lexus LC500h later this year.

The catalyst uses Denso's FLAD (Flow Adjustable Design Cell) substrate with a different cell cross-sectional area at the inner portion compared to that at the outer portion.

Toyota has conducted research and development into finding solutions to help improve the purification efficiency of catalytic precious metals, such as finding the optimal substrate shape and length, as well as modifying the cell wall thickness and cross-sectional area.

Other efforts include selectively washcoating precious metals and other catalytic materials, and changing catalytic substrate cell density in line with exhaust gas flows.

For more details, read Toyota's release here.