Low-Temperature Water Gas Shift Reaction on Copper Nanoparticles

Project: National Science and Technology CouncilNational Science and Technology Council Academic Grants

Project Details

Abstract

Atomic layer epitaxy (ALE) is a method for growing single crystals and thin films with the primary advantage that it allows a good conformal coating to obtain nano-particle of metals. This self-controlling feature of ALE allows the growth of uniform compound layers not only on flat substrates but on porous, heterogeneous surfaces. The ALE technique will be applied to produce high dispersion catalysts in this study. In the research reported herein, a Cu/SiO2 catalyst with nanoscale copper particles was prepared using the ALE technique, and the newly developed copper catalysts were found to display dramatic activity for the WGS reaction at room temperature. In the first year, the active sites and chemical state of the ALE-Cu/SiO2 catalyst are discussed in relation to the characterization and activity results of the WGS reaction. The kinetic parameters for WGS reaction on ALE-Cu/SiO2 catalyst will be measured, and are used to propose to possible reaction mechanism. We used CO as a probe molecule to identify the active sites on the ALE-Cu/SiO2 catalyst, because it is a good probe molecule for vibrational spectroscopy and can usually provide important information about the surface sites of adsorbed species and the chemical environment of a copper surface. In the second year, the reaction mechanism of WGS reaction, active sites for H2O adsorbed and H2O dissociation will be investigated by the IR and TPD techniques. We will build up a flow reaction system combining FT-IR, TPD and GC-TCD techniques. On the other hand, FIIR also will be applied to perform the kinetic parameters for WGS reaction on ALE-Cu/SiO2 surface. In the third year, the fundamental properties of ALE Cu catalysts will be studied in that Cu precursor binding with porous support, decomposition of Cu precursor on support and formation mechanism of Cu particle from Cu precursor. The ALE-Cu/SiO2 catalysts will be investigated the aggregation of Cu particles under high temperature. We will focus the study on the fundamentally growth of Cu particles on surface. The examination of catalysts, by EXAFS, DR-UV/VIS, TPR, XRD, AES, ESCA etc., may be associated with experimental results of TPD and IR.

Project IDs

Project ID:PA9807-2085
External Project ID:NSC98-2113-M182-001-MY2
StatusFinished
Effective start/end date01/08/0931/07/10

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