Photo-thermo semi-hydrogenation of acetylene on Pd<sub>1</sub>/TiO<sub>2</sub> single-atom catalyst.
basic_science · Level V
Where this comes from
- Record sourced from PubMed, PMID 35551203.
- Also identified by DOI 10.1038/s41467-022-30291-x and PMC identifier 9098498.
- 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
Semi-hydrogenation of acetylene in excess ethylene is a key industrial process for ethylene purification. Supported Pd catalysts have attracted most attention due to their superior intrinsic activity but often suffer from low selectivity. Pd single-atom catalysts (SACs) are promising to significantly improve the selectivity, but the activity needs to be improved and the feasible preparation of Pd SACs remains a grand challenge. Here, we report a simple strategy to construct Pd<sub>1</sub>/TiO<sub>2</sub> SACs by selectively encapsulating the co-existed small amount of Pd nanoclusters/nanoparticles based on their different strong metal-support interaction (SMSI) occurrence conditions. In addition, photo-thermo catalysis has been applied to this process where a much-improved catalytic activity was obtained. Detailed characterization combined with DFT calculation suggests that photo-induced electrons transferred from TiO<sub>2</sub> to the adjacent Pd atoms facilitate the activation of acetylene. This work offers an opportunity to develop highly stable Pd SACs for efficient catalytic semi-hydrogenation process.