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At age 82, William Miller might be excused for kicking back, playing with grandkids or simply puttering around. He's doing none of those things. Instead, Miller is leading a start-up with two big ambitions: to clean up diesel emissions and to spread a new approach to designing a key ingredient in countless chemical reactions, namely catalysts.

"I like to be an explorer. This is an exploration," declares Miller.

And that approach--the exploration of both a new technology and of the opportunity for using that nascent tool--is at the core of genuine innovation.

Over the course of his 53-year career, Miller has been a computer scientist, chairman of a major software maker, an adviser to both venture capitalists and government leaders, and a teacher. These days, he is chairman and co-founder of Nanostellar, a four-year-old, 22-person start-up in Redwood City, Calif. Miller is too savvy to use the hyperbolic language common to most start-up founders. But he exudes quiet confidence that Nanostellar has a shot at making a genuine difference, both in reducing greenhouse gas emissions and in changing commercial chemistry.

Nanostellar is developing novel chemical catalysts that promise big improvements over existing ingredients. The company's first product: fine powders of precious metals--gold, platinum and palladium--that when used to coat a filter for a diesel truck or car can reduce its toxic emissions by as much as 40% over existing catalytic converters. At Nanostellar's heart is a computer program that predicts how different compounds will work under specified conditions. Think of it as a design tool for chemists: "We have CAD-CAM tools for mechanical engineers, computer-aided design for circuit makers," says Pankaj Dhingra, Nanostellar's chief executive. "The impact our tool could have on the world of chemicals is absolutely humongous."

How does a septuagenarian wind up starting a company at the very forefront of new technology? By never retiring in the first place.

Back in 2003, Miller was juggling a collection of assignments, including advising groups at Stanford University, where he served as Provost, and a few company boards. He had always been an overachiever: He was the last hire of Stanford's famed Fredrick Terman and one of the first five advisers to venture group the Mayfield Fund, when it started in 1969. Over the years, he also chaired Borland Software (nasdaq: BORL - news - people ), worked as chief executive of SRI International and hobnobbed with China's leaders, including Zhang Zemin and Li Peng. Colleagues often turned to him for advice--as did fellow Stanford professor KJ Cho.

Cho and longtime collaborator Jonathan Woo had been brainstorming about how to take to market what seemed like a promising tool--a way to design chemical catalysts on computers. Other fields were already using similar tools, including biochemists who analyze protein structures via computer models. Early this decade, Cho and Woo realized that the convergence of more powerful computers, better design algorithms and rapid advances in materials science--particularly in the excruciatingly small realm of nanomaterials--was finally promising to open up catalytic chemistry to computer modeling.

Miller's advice: Build a product, not just a tool. He also tested their ambitions with a well-honed set of questions: "Does the technology work? Can it scale? Is it robust? And who wants it?"

That last question, Miller says, can be a killer. "If the answer is 'Everyone,' then my next question is: 'Name one.' "

Together with Miller, Cho and Woo scrutinized what fields could be significantly improved with better catalysts. Scrubbing the toxic emissions created by burning carbon-based fuels was high on their list. But gasoline auto makers have poured billions into refining the catalytic converters used in consumer vehicles; utility plants, swaddled in regulations, are cautious adopters of new technology.

The diesel trucking industry, however, still used an expensive approach to reducing its emission problems, namely catalytic converters that rely on the highly reactive--and highly expensive--material platinum. The computer model that Cho and Woo developed suggested intriguing alternatives, including catalysts made of nanosize particles of gold and alloys of gold, palladium and platinum.

Since then, Miller and Woo have continued to build Nanostellar into a full-fledged company. Miller took the business lead, helping raise $26 million in venture capital from investors that include 3i Technology Partners, Khosla Ventures, Monitor Ventures and others. He helped hire a chief executive for Nanostellar and other key managers. "It's more acceptable now to tell company founders they can't run a company," he says wryly. Woo is chief technology officer.

Nanostellar has developed three variants of catalysts using gold, platinum and palladium. Its work is winning technical accolades: Late last year, the start-up was picked as one of 39 "technology pioneers" for 2008 by the World Economic Forum--a honor that has in past years gone to the likes of Google (nasdaq: GOOG - news - people ) and Napster (nasdaq: NAPS - news - people ).

Customers are emerging, too--even though Miller ruefully says that business has taken a bit longer to develop than he and his co-founders had originally hoped.

In conjunction with a manufacturing partner based in Pennsylvania, Nanostellar sells powders that are used to coat the honeycomb-like filters used in diesel vehicles. One European customer is using its powder to improve emissions in existing vehicles; a European car maker is planning to incorporate Nanostellar's powder in a new fleet of diesel-based cars.

"Technically, every class of engine that runs differently should have a different catalyst," Miller observes. A UPS truck engine, for instance, is different from the machine driving an 18-wheeler. How much time an engine runs "cold" changes its emissions, too, he adds.

Miller remains cheerfully upbeat about how Nanostellar's technology can improve the world. And with any luck, this won't be his last venture. "Wait until I tell you about my next idea for a start-up," he quips.

See Also:
Innovation Saves The Environment

Intel Shrinks Again

Davos: Du Pont Gets Green

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