Enhanced oxidation activity from modified ceria: MnOx-ceria, CrOx-ceria and Mg doped VOx-ceria

Ceria is an important component of catalysts for oxidation reactions that proceed through the Mars-van Krevelen mechanism, promoting activity. A paradigm example of this is the VOx–CeO2 system for oxidative dehydrogenation reactions, where vanadium oxide species are supported on ceria and a special synergy between them is behind the enhanced activity: reduction of the catalyst is promoted by ceria undergoing reduction. This leads to favourable oxygen vacancy formation and hydrogen adsorption energies—useful descriptors for the oxidation activity of VOx–CeO2 catalysts. In this paper, we examine if this promoting effect on ceria-based catalysts holds for other metal oxide modifiers and we investigate MnOn– and CrOn–CeO2(111) (n = 0 − 4) as examples. We show, combining density functional theory calculations and statistical thermodynamics that similarly to the vanadia modifier, the stable species in each case is MnO2– and CrO2–CeO2. Both show favourable energetics for oxygen vacancy formation and hydrogen adsorption, indicating that VO2–CeO2 is not the only system of this type that can have an enhanced activity for oxidation reactions. However, the mechanism involved in each case is different: CrO2–CeO2 shows similar properties to VO2–CeO2 with ceria reduction upon oxygen removal stabilising the 5+ oxidation state of Cr. In contrast, with MnO2–CeO2, Mn is preferentially reduced. Finally, a model system of VO2–Mg:CeO2 is explored that shows a synergy between VO2 modification and Mg doping. These results shed light on the factors involved in active oxidation catalysts based on supported metal oxides on ceria that should be taken into consideration in a rational design of such catalysts

Facet-dependent stability of near-surface oxygen vacancies and excess charge localization at CeO2surfaces

To study the dependence of the relative stability of surface (V A) and subsurface (VB) oxygen vacancies with the crystal facet of CeO2, the reduced (100), (110) and (111) surfaces, with two different concentrations of vacancies, were investigated by means of density functional theory (DFT + U) calculations. The results show that the trend in the near-surface vacancy formation energies for comparable vacancy spacings, i.e. (110) < (100) < (111), does not follow the one in the surface stability of the facets, i.e. (111) < (110) < (100). The results also reveal that the preference of vacancies for surface or subsurface sites, as well as the preferred location of the associated Ce3+ polarons, are facet- and concentration-dependent. At the higher vacancy concentration, the V A is more stable than the V B at the (110) facet whereas at the (111), it is the other way around, and at the (100) facet, both the V A and the VB have similar stability. The stability of the V A vacancies, compared to that of the V B, is accentuated as the concentration decreases. Nearest neighbor polarons to the vacant sites are only observed for the less densely packed (110) and (100) facets. These findings are rationalized in terms of the packing density of the facets, the lattice relaxation effects induced by vacancy formation and the localization of the excess charge, as well as the repulsive Ce3+-Ce3+ interactions.Fil: Pérez Bailac, Patricia. Universidad Autónoma de Madrid; España. Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas; EspañaFil: Lustemberg, Pablo German. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Rosario. Instituto de Física de Rosario. Universidad Nacional de Rosario. Instituto de Física de Rosario; Argentina. Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas; EspañaFil: Ganduglia Pirovano, M. Verónica. Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas; Españ

Counting electrons transferred through a thin alumina film into Au chains

Low-temperature STM measurements combined with density functional theory calculations are employed to study the adsorption of gold on alumina/NiAl(110). The binding of Au monomers involves breaking of an oxide Al-O bond below the adatom and stabilizing the hence undercoordinated O ion by forming a new bond to an Al atom in the NiAl. The adsorption implies negative charging of the adatom. The linear arrangement of favorable binding sites induces the self-organization of Au atoms into chains. For every ad-chain, the number of transfer electrons from the support is determined by analyzing the node structure of the corresponding highest occupied molecular orbital

Vibrational frequencies of CO bound to all three low-index cerium oxide surfaces: A consistent theoretical description of vacancy-induced changes using density functional theory

The facet-dependent adsorption of CO on oxidized and reduced CeO$_2$ single crystal surfaces is reviewed, with emphasis on the effect of CO coverage and the ability of state-of-the-art quantum-mechanical methods to provide reliable energies and an accurate description of the IR vibrational frequency of CO. Comparison with detailed, high-resolution experimental infrared reflection absorption spectroscopy data obtained for single crystal samples allows the assignment of the different CO vibrational bands observed on all three low-index ceria surfaces. Good agreement is achieved with the hybrid density functional theory approach with the HSE06 functional and with saturation coverage. It is shown that CO is very sensitive to the structure of cerium oxide surfaces and to the presence of oxygen vacancies. The combined theoretical-experimental approach offers new opportunities for a better characterization of ceria nanoparticles and for unraveling changes occurring during reactions involving CO at higher pressures