Nanocatalysis I: Synthesis of Metal and Bimetallic Nanoparticles and Porous Oxides and Their Catalytic Reaction Studies

In recent heterogeneous catalysis, much effort has been made in understanding how the size, shape, and composition of nanoparticles and oxide-metal interfaces affect catalytic performance at the molecular level. Recent advances in colloidal synthetic techniques enable preparing diverse metallic or bimetallic nanoparticles with well-defined size, shape, and composition and porous oxides as a high surface support. As nanoparticles become smaller, new chemical, physical, and catalytic properties emerge. Geometrically, as the smaller the nanoparticle the greater the relative number of edge and corner sites per unit surface of the nanoparticle. When the nanoparticles are smaller than a critical size (2.7 nm), finite-size effects such as a change of adsorption strength or oxidation state are revealed by changes in their electronic structures. By alloying two metals, the formation of heteroatom bonds and geometric effects such as strain due to the change of metal–metal bond lengths cause new electronic structures to appear in bimetallic nanoparticles. Ceaseless catalytic reaction studies have been discovered that the highest reaction yields, product selectivity, and process stability were achieved by determining the critical size, shape, and composition of nanoparticles and by choosing the appropriate oxide support. Depending on the pore size, various kinds of micro-, meso-, and macro-porous materials are fabricated by the aid of structure-directing agents or hard-templates. Recent achievements for the preparation of versatile core/shell nanostructures composing mesoporous oxides, zeolites, and metal organic frameworks provide new insights toward nanocatalysis with novel ideas.