Design of exquisite metal nanoparticle catalysts using metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) as spatial confinement templates.
This project will focus on the design of exquisite metal nanoparticle catalysts using metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) as both sacrificial hard templates and spatial confinement templates for well-defined microporous metal oxides supports.
A number of very recent papers suggest the enhanced activity of highly dispersed sub-nanometer metal particle catalysts for a number of reactions, such as ammonia synthesis, CO oxidation, alkene hydrogenation, methanol-reforming, water slitting, water-gas shift reaction, etc. Metal-organic frameworks (MOFs), constructed from coordination bonds between metal cations and organic ligands, have emerged as the research frontier in porous materials because of their ultrahigh porosity and wide tunability.
By using microporous MOF templates, molecular-level interactions between the metal precursors and the support are enabled, securing and dispersing the active metal catalytic sites. Tuning the metal-support interactions by MOF templates to enhance the activity and stability of supported metal catalysts will be of primary interest to develop promising applications in promoting solar and hydrogen energy utilization for mitigating the current environmental deterioration concerns. A catalytic bespoke flow rig experiments and process simulations will play a decisive role in this project to evaluate the real catalytic performance of as-synthesized catalysts. Gas sorption isotherms, kinetic data, and in-situ FTIR will be measured and monitored to probe the fundamental absorption-activation-led active sites of metal nanoparticles. The overall performance of MOF-derived metal nanoparticle catalysts will be evaluated based on the conversion, turnover frequency (TOF), materials cost, and cyclic stability. Other potential characterization techniques include PXRD, EXAFS, XPS, FESEM, HR-TEM, ASAP 2020, in-situ CO chemisorption, HAADF-STEM.
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