Developing New Paradigms for Applied Catalytic Surface Science

Catalytic surface science was developed as a method of “simplifying” the problem of heterogenous catalysis by determining kinetics and mechanisms on compositionally well-defined single-crystal metal surfaces [1]. While fundamental studies are vital to our understanding of catalytic processes, transferring this knowledge to “real-world” catalytic systems is extremely difficult. In an attempt to bridge this (so-called) gap, we are developing instrumentation and methodologies to probe kinetic and mechanistic information with the same resolution as surface science while using “real-world” catalytic materials. We have developed a number of home-built transient packed bed reactors in order to study “real-world” catalytic materials/systems. Using CO oxidation over a Pd catalyst as a test reaction we are able to recreate complex catalytic behaviour witnessed in a UHV molecular beam system [2] in a packed bed reactor at 108 times higher pressure. Further, we are able to use time-resolved simulations of our transient experiments to demonstrate continuity between the kinetics coefficients measured using molecular beams [2] and those measured on our materials under “real-world” conditions.