Polymorph selection towards photocatalytic gaseous CO<sub>2</sub> hydrogenation.
basic_science · Level V
Where this comes from
- Record sourced from PubMed, PMID 31175311.
- Also identified by DOI 10.1038/s41467-019-10524-2 and PMC identifier 6555785.
- Licence recorded as CC BY.
- The licence permits redistribution, so the abstract is shown in full and the full text is available from the publisher.
Abstract
Titanium dioxide is the only known material that can enable gas-phase CO<sub>2</sub> photocatalysis in its anatase and rutile polymorphic forms. Materials engineering of polymorphism provides a useful strategy for optimizing the performance metrics of a photocatalyst. In this paper, it is shown that the less well known rhombohedral polymorph of indium sesquioxide, like its well-documented cubic polymorph, is a CO<sub>2</sub> hydrogenation photocatalyst for the production of CH<sub>3</sub>OH and CO. Significantly, the rhombohedral polymorph exhibits higher activity, superior stability and improved selectivity towards CH<sub>3</sub>OH over CO. These gains in catalyst performance originate in the enhanced acidity and basicity of surface frustrated Lewis pairs in the rhombohedral form.