Interesting catalysis can occur when an active metal is supported on another metal. My research group has developed this materials concept to probe various mild-temperature, aqueous-based chemical reactions, towards the long-term goal of understanding structure-property relationships of model catalysts in a rational manner. I will discuss how nanoparticles of gold supporting palladium metal (Pd-on-Au NPs) show catalytic activity for nitrophenol reduction to aminophenol. I then discuss how this material can be used to study nitrite anion reduction to dinitrogen, with results that illustrate the similarities and differences between nitrite and nitrophenol reactivities. Finally, I discuss our efforts to develop NPs that can catalytically degrade nitrate anions, a harder reaction to carry out. The metal-on-metal structure shows usefulness for the catalytic reduction of nitrate and nitrite anions, and of nitrophenol, with the metal surface coverage as the governing parameter in controlling overall reactivity.

Developing metal-on-metal catalysts for nitrate, nitrite and nitrophenol catalytic reduction

247th National Meeting (2014)

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