Catalysis is one of the most important technologies in the industrial world, controlling more than 90% of industrial chemical processes and essential for large-scale production of plastics and fuel. Exploring the most common type of catalysis used in industry, Electron Microscopy in Heterogeneous Catalysis provides a coherent account of heterogeneous catalytic processes and catalyst surface structure at the atomic scale as elucidated by electron microscopy techniques.
The book addresses a number of issues that are fundamental to the understanding of heterogeneous catalysis by oxides and supported metals. The properties of a catalyst are governed by its microstructure and chemistry on an atomic scale, and electron microscopy methods are essential to directly analyze these properties. The book provides important information about active species, metastable-transient species, mechanisms of particle catalysis sintering, promoter-poisoning effects on an atomic scale, and catalyst support interactions on a microscale.
AN INTRODUCTION TO HETEROGENEOUS CATALYSIS AND CATALYST STRUCTURES
Science and technology of catalysis
Fundamental principles of catalysis: some basic definitions
Electronic configurations and quantum theory
Chemical bonding
Thermodynamic definitions relevant to catalysis and the role of electron microscopy
Structure and chemistry of carbons and hydrocarbons
Catalysis and band theory
Some important structures of solid catalysts
Carbons as supports in catalysis and new forms of carbons with atomic scale building blocks
Oxides and nonstoichiometry in catalysis and the unique role of electron microscopy
Catalysis by oxides
Extended defects and crystallographic shear
ELECTRON MICROSCOPY AND DIFFRACTION IN HETEROGENEOUS CATALYSIS
Background
Imaging in the TEM
Surface profiling in HRTEM
Chemical composition analysis of catalysts in the EM
Electron energy loss spectroscopy (EELS)
Convergent beam electron diffraction (CBED)
The development of in situ environmental TM (ETEM) under controlled reaction environments to probe catalysis at the atomic level
Novel wet-ETEM development for nanoscale studies of liquid-catalyst reactions at operating temperatures
Scanning EM (SEM), cathodoluminescence in catalysis and environmental SEM (ESEM)
Scanning transmission EM (STEM)-recent advances
Image processing
Other developments
Parallel chemical studies and correlations with the catalyst microstructure
ELECTRON MICROSCOPY STUDIES OF CATALYSIS BY OXIDES
Single and mixed metal oxide systems: Redox pathways and anion deficiency
Single metal oxide catalysts: MoO3
In situ direct observations of surface defect structures in catalysts under controlled reducing environments and methods for defect analysis
Shear domains and crystallographic shear (CS) planes in catalytic reduction
Electron microscopy and defect thermodynamics: a new understanding of oxidation catalysis
The role of defects in catalytic reactions
Multi-component (practical) oxide catalysts
Iron molybdates in methanol oxidation reactions
Vanadium phosphate (V-P-O) catalysts for butane oxidation technology: the elucidation of active sites by in situ electron microscopy
Examples of other mixed metal oxide systems
Electronic structure of crystallites and dopant distributions by cathodoluminescence electron microscopy
Zirconia (ZrO2)-based solid-acid catalysts and ceria (CeO2) systems
The key role of electron microscopy in the discovery of novel reaction mechanisms in selective oxidation catalysis
Stable silica-based ceramic oxide supports for catalysts: some recent developments
CATALYSIS BY ZEOLITES AND MOLECULAR SIEVES
Structures, acidity, and uses of zeolites
Silicalites and aluminophosphates
Determining three-dimensional structures by ED and HRTEM: MALPO solid acid catalysts
CATALYSIS BY SUPPORTED METAL PARTICLES
Recent developments
Facile versus structure-sensitive reactions
Preparation and characterization of model and practical metallic catalysts
Catalytic mechanisms on supported metals
Experimental studies by electron microscopy
Small particles in HRTEM
Experimental and theoretical developments in small metal particle catalysis using electron microscopy
Structure of small metal particles
EM studies of chemical interactions at metal-support interfaces
Metal-support interactions
In situ ETEM studies of metal-irreducible ceramic support interactions
Methanol synthesis and oxidation reactions
Monometallic nanocatalyst systems: copper nanocatalysts supported on silica (Cu/SiO2)
Bimetallic or alloy systems: atomic structure and composition
Fischer-Tropsch and Ziegler Nutta catalysis
ENVIRONMENTAL CATALYSIS AND CATALYST DESIGN
Perovskite-based catalysts for environmental pollution control: the role of electron microscopy
High temperature superconducting cuprates (HTSC) as catalysts
Hydrodesulfurization (HDS) catalysis
Nanocatalysts in emission control, steam reforming, photocatalysis, and fuel cell catalysis
Nanocatalysts for alternatives to chlorofluorocarbons (CFC)
Concluding remarks
References
Index
Biography
P L Gai, DuPont, Central Research and Development, Wilmington, DE, USA and University of Delaware, Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Newark, USA, formerly at the University of Cambridge E D Boyes, DuPont, Central Research and Development, Wilmington, USA (and formerly University of Oxford).
"This book deals with in situ dynamic observation and analysis of heterogeneous catalysis using environmental cells (EC) in transmission (TEM) and scanning electron microscopes (SEM). In general, it is based on outstanding and unique works carried out by the authors themselves over the past three decades, who pioneered this key enabling area of materials science. It provides comprehensive and yet compact introductions to heterogeneous catalysis and electron microscopy and diffraction, followed by detailed descriptions of electron microscopy studies of oxide catalysis, zeolites, molecular sieves, supported small metal particles, and environmental catalysis. For those who are carrying out in situ dynamic studies of catalysis using EC in TEM and/or SEM, this book gives a state-of-the-art review of this field. More importantly, this book encourages those catalysis students and electron microscopists who are planning to perform in situ dynamic studies of catalysis."
-Professor Hiroyasu Saka, Nagoya University, Japan
"P.L. Gai and E.D. Boyes have produced an authoritative text … [that is] indispensable if this is your subject."
-P. Hawkes, Ultramicroscopy 101 (2004): 73-103