Research into the conversion of CO/CO2 to useful or less harmful products has remained a priority for decades. Mechanistic studies are crucial to understanding how these processes occur over catalysts, which can facilitate the improvement of known catalysts as well as lead to the fabrication of more efficient catalysts. Kinetic and ambient pressure photoelectron spectroscopy (AP-XPS) studies are utilized to elucidate the role of the oxide (ZnO, TiO2)-metal (Cu, Au) interface in the enhanced reactivity of CO and CO2 over inverse catalyst systems. The kinetic and AP-XPS results reveal a general trend: while the individual components exhibit little to know reactivity, a small coverage (&lt; 0.3 ML) of oxide on the metal substrate dramatically enhances activity due to the stabilization of key intermediate species identified by AP-XPS. Additionally, the particle size and oxide-metal interactions affect the chemical and catalytic properties of the oxide nanoparticles making them significantly different from the bulk oxide.

Mechanistic studies of CO/CO2 reactivity over inverse (oxide/metal) model catalysts

255th National Meeting (2018)

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