Bouchard's laboratory has been developing novel methodology and instrumentation for visualizing chemical reaction processes and thermodynamics in real time. Other co-authors on the paper include Stefan Glöggler, Trenton Otto, Arek Melkonian, William Morris and Scott R. Burt (Brigham Young University). Otto and Melkonian are recipients of Senior Undergraduate Research Scholar awards from UCLA's Undergraduate Research Scholars Program. The research, which is federally funded by the National Science Foundation, was carried out in collaboration with Omar M. Yaghi, UC Berkeley's James and Neeltje Tretter Professor of Chemistry, in order to demonstrate the methodology on new, emerging catalysts based on metal organic frameworks, which are projected to be ideal platforms for lab-on-a-chip catalysis at the microscale.

Catalytic micro-reactors may provide green chemistry alternatives — less chemical waste, lower cost and minimal energy waste — to conventional, industrial-sized reactors because they make it easier to control the chemical-reaction conditions and operate the reactor closer to optimal conditions. However, a longstanding problem has been the lack of tools to map out the chemical reaction conditions inside micro-reactors. Bouchard and his co-workers have now demonstrated non-invasive maps of gas temperatures inside micro-reactors with the assistance of MRI.