Skip to main content
U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

Direct Visualization of Catalytically Active Sites at the FeO–Pt(111) Interface

Journal Article · · ACS Nano
 [1];  [2];  [3];  [2];  [3];  [3];  [3];  [2];  [3]
  1. Aarhus Univ., Aarhus (Denmark); Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, University of Wisconsin-Madison
  2. Univ. of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI (United States)
  3. Aarhus Univ., Aarhus (Denmark)

Within the area of surface science, one of the “holy grails” is to directly visualize a chemical reaction at the atomic scale. Whereas this goal has been reached by high-resolution scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) in a number of cases for reactions occurring at flat surfaces, such a direct view is often inhibited for reaction occurring at steps and interfaces. Here we have studied the CO oxidation reaction at the interface between ultrathin FeO islands and a Pt(111) support by in situ STM and density functional theory (DFT) calculations. Time-lapsed STM imaging on this inverse model catalyst in O2 and CO environments revealed catalytic activity occurring at the FeO–Pt(111) interface and directly showed that the Fe-edges host the catalytically most active sites for the CO oxidation reaction. This is an important result since previous evidence for the catalytic activity of the FeO–Pt(111) interface is essentially based on averaging techniques in conjunction with DFT calculations. As a result, the presented STM results are in accord with DFT+U calculations, in which we compare possible CO oxidation pathways on oxidized Fe-edges and O-edges. We found that the CO oxidation reaction is more favorable on the oxidized Fe-edges, both thermodynamically and kinetically.

Research Organization:
Univ. of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES) (SC-22)
Contributing Organization:
National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC), Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), and Argonne National Laboratory (ANL); DoD High Performance Computing Modernization Program (US Air Force Research Laboratory DoD Supercomputing Resource Center (AFRL DSRC), the US Army Engineer Research and Development Center (ERDC), and the Navy DoD Supercomputing Resource Center (Navy DSRC)
Grant/Contract Number:
FG02-05ER15731
OSTI ID:
1397273
Alternate ID(s):
OSTI ID: 1214063
Journal Information:
ACS Nano, Journal Name: ACS Nano Journal Issue: 8 Vol. 9; ISSN 1936-0851
Publisher:
American Chemical Society (ACS)Copyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English

References (75)

Reactions at Surfaces: From Atoms to Complexity (Nobel Lecture) journal April 2008
Charge Trapping at the Step Edges of TiO 2 Anatase (101) journal March 2014
Visualization of Atomic Processes on Ruthenium Dioxide using Scanning Tunneling Microscopy journal February 2004
CO Oxidation at the Perimeters of an FeO/Pt(111) Interface and how Water Promotes the Activity: A First-Principles Study journal December 2011
Metal supported oxide nanostructures: model systems for advanced catalysis journal September 2007
A comparative study in structure and reactivity of “FeO x -on-Pt” and “NiO x -on-Pt” catalysts journal December 2014
Chemisorption of CO on the Pt(111) surface journal May 1977
A molecular beam investigation of the interactions of CO with a Pt(111) surface journal May 1981
Structure, composition and chemisorption studies of thin ordered iron oxide films on platinum (111) journal January 1988
Efficiency of ab-initio total energy calculations for metals and semiconductors using a plane-wave basis set journal July 1996
CO on Pt(111): binding site assignment from the interplay between measured and calculated STM images journal January 1999
Surface chemistry and catalysis on well-defined epitaxial iron-oxide layers journal March 2002
Formation of Periodic Arrays of O Vacancy Clusters on Monolayer FeO Islands Grown on Pt(111) journal August 2010
A first-principles study of the structure, electronic properties, and oxygen binding of FeO/Pt(111) and FeO2/Pt(111) journal May 2013
Bridging the structure gap: Chemistry of nanostructured surfaces at well-defined defects journal March 2008
CO adsorption and thermal stability of Pd deposited on a thin FeO(111) film journal July 2005
Highly active surfaces for CO oxidation on Rh, Pd, and Pt journal December 2007
Atomic-scale surface science phenomena studied by scanning tunneling microscopy journal June 2009
Correlating STM contrast and atomic-scale structure by chemical modification: Vacancy dislocation loops on FeO/Pt(111) journal January 2009
Reduction of FeO/Pt(111) thin films by exposure to atomic hydrogen journal January 2010
Inverse oxide/metal catalysts: A versatile approach for activity tests and mechanistic studies journal February 2010
Dissociative and molecular oxygen chemisorption channels on reduced rutile TiO2(110): An STM and TPD study journal October 2010
Interface-Confined Oxide Nanostructures for Catalytic Oxidation Reactions journal March 2013
Surface Chemistry of Ruthenium Dioxide in Heterogeneous Catalysis and Electrocatalysis: From Fundamental to Applied Research journal March 2012
Structure–Property Relationship and Chemical Aspects of Oxide–Metal Hybrid Nanostructures journal December 2012
Surface Chemistry of Late Transition Metal Oxides journal December 2012
Structure and Chemical State of the Pt(557) Surface during Hydrogen Oxidation Reaction Studied by in Situ Scanning Tunneling Microscopy and X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy journal August 2013
Adsorption and Dissociation of O 2 on Gold Surfaces:  Effect of Steps and Strain journal September 2003
Growth and Characterization of Two-Dimensional FeO Nanoislands Supported on Pt(111) journal July 2010
Tip-Dependent Scanning Tunneling Microscopy Imaging of Ultrathin FeO Films on Pt(111) journal December 2010
Theoretical Study of the Role of a Metal–Cation Ensemble at the Oxide–Metal Boundary on CO Oxidation journal March 2012
Scanning Tunneling Microscopy Evidence for the Dissociation of Carbon Monoxide on Ruthenium Steps journal June 2012
Edges of FeO/Pt(111) Interface: A First-Principle Theoretical Study journal January 2013
Structure of Stoichiometric and Oxygen-Rich Ultrathin FeO(111) Films Grown on Pd(111) journal July 2013
Vicinal Rutile TiO 2 Surfaces and Their Interactions with O 2 journal February 2014
Unraveling the Edge Structures of Platinum(111)-Supported Ultrathin FeO Islands: The Influence of Oxidation State journal January 2015
Observation of All the Intermediate Steps of a Chemical Reaction on an Oxide Surface by Scanning Tunneling Microscopy journal February 2009
Dissociative hydrogen adsorption on palladium requires aggregates of three or more vacancies journal April 2003
Single-atom catalysis of CO oxidation using Pt1/FeOx journal July 2011
The role of steps in surface catalysis and reaction oscillations journal July 2010
Carbon monoxide-induced adatom sintering in a Pd–Fe3O4 model catalyst journal June 2013
The mechanism of the catalytic action of platinum in the reactions 2Co + O2= 2Co2 and 2H2+ O2= 2H2O journal January 1922
A climbing image nudged elastic band method for finding saddle points and minimum energy paths journal December 2000
A molecular beam study of the catalytic oxidation of CO on a Pt(111) surface journal December 1980
Theory of the scanning tunneling microscope journal January 1985
Accurate and simple analytic representation of the electron-gas correlation energy journal June 1992
Projector augmented-wave method journal December 1994
Efficient iterative schemes for ab initio total-energy calculations using a plane-wave basis set journal October 1996
Electron-energy-loss spectra and the structural stability of nickel oxide: An LSDA+U study journal January 1998
From ultrasoft pseudopotentials to the projector augmented-wave method journal January 1999
Interplay between structural, magnetic, and electronic properties in a Fe O ∕ Pt ( 111 ) ultrathin film journal August 2007
Tuning the Stoichiometry of Surface Oxide Phases by Step Morphology: Ag ( 511 ) versus Ag ( 210 ) journal December 2008
Formation and Diffusion of Water Dimers on Rutile TiO 2 ( 110 ) journal June 2009
Reduced Step Edges on Rutile TiO 2 ( 110 ) as Competing Defects to Oxygen Vacancies on the Terraces and Reactive Sites for Ethanol Dissociation journal October 2012
Role of Steps in the Dissociative Adsorption of Water on Rutile TiO 2 ( 110 ) journal April 2013
Existence of a “Hot” Atom Mechanism for the Dissociation of O 2 on Pt(111) journal July 1996
Role of Steps in N 2 Activation on Ru(0001) journal August 1999
Atomic-Scale Structure of Single-Layer MoS 2 Nanoclusters journal January 2000
Oxygen Dissociation at Pt Steps journal July 2001
Adsorbate-Induced Alloy Phase Separation: A Direct View by High-Pressure Scanning Tunneling Microscopy journal September 2005
One-Dimensional PtO 2 at Pt Steps: Formation and Reaction with CO journal December 2005
A fully automated, ‘thimble-size’ scanning tunnelling microscope journal December 1988
Spatiotemporal Self-Organization in a Surface Reaction: From the Atomic to the Mesoscopic Scale journal August 2001
Water Diffusion and Clustering on Pd(111) journal September 2002
Ammonia Synthesis from First-Principles Calculations journal January 2005
Activity of CeOx and TiOx Nanoparticles Grown on Au(111) in the Water-Gas Shift Reaction journal December 2007
Interface-Confined Ferrous Centers for Catalytic Oxidation journal May 2010
Spectroscopic Observation of Dual Catalytic Sites During Oxidation of CO on a Au/TiO2 Catalyst journal August 2011
Water-Mediated Proton Hopping on an Iron Oxide Surface journal May 2012
The Active Site of Methanol Synthesis over Cu/ZnO/Al2O3 Industrial Catalysts journal April 2012
Interfacial Effects in Iron-Nickel Hydroxide-Platinum Nanoparticles Enhance Catalytic Oxidation journal May 2014
The critical role of water at the gold-titania interface in catalytic CO oxidation journal September 2014
Identification of the "Active Sites" of a Surface-Catalyzed Reaction journal September 1996
Atomic and Macroscopic Reaction Rates of a Surface-Catalyzed Reaction journal December 1997
Design of a Surface Alloy Catalyst for Steam Reforming journal March 1998

Cited By (13)

Enhanced oxidation resistance of active nanostructures via dynamic size effect journal February 2017
Fe Oxides on Ag Surfaces: Structure and Reactivity text January 2017
Carbon Monoxide Oxidation on Metal-Supported Monolayer Oxide Films: Establishing Which Interface is Active journal January 2018
Carbon Monoxide Oxidation on Metal-Supported Monolayer Oxide Films: Establishing Which Interface is Active journal January 2018
Immobilization of Pt Nanoparticles via Rapid and Reusable Electropolymerization of Dopamine on TiO 2 Nanotube Arrays for Reversible SERS Substrates and Nonenzymatic Glucose Sensors journal March 2017
Fe Oxides on Ag Surfaces: Structure and Reactivity journal September 2016
CO Oxidation at SnO2/Pt3Sn(111) Interfaces journal September 2018
Edge reactivity and water-assisted dissociation on cobalt oxide nanoislands journal January 2017
Stabilization of ultrathin (hydroxy)oxide films on transition metal substrates for electrochemical energy conversion journal May 2017
Controlling the charge state of supported nanoparticles in catalysis: lessons from model systems journal January 2018
Structural and electronic properties of Fe dopants in cobalt oxide nanoislands on Au(111) journal January 2019
Interface-confined triangular FeO x nanoclusters on Pt(111) journal December 2019
The Roles of Oxide Growth and Sub-Surface Facets in Oxygen Evolution Activity of Iridium and Its Impact on Electrolysis journal January 2019

Similar Records

Direct Visualization of Catalytically Active Sites at the FeO-Pt(111) Interface
Journal Article · Tue Aug 25 00:00:00 EDT 2015 · ACS Nano, 9(8):7804-7814 · OSTI ID:1214063

Structure of Stoichiometric and Oxygen-Rich Ultrathin FeO(111) Films Grown on Pd(111)
Journal Article · Thu Jul 25 00:00:00 EDT 2013 · Journal of Physical Chemistry. C · OSTI ID:1097932

Identification of O-rich structures on platinum(111)-supported ultrathin iron oxide films
Journal Article · Tue Jan 05 23:00:00 EST 2016 · Surface Science · OSTI ID:1397266