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Although technologically promising, the reduction of carbon dioxide (CO2) to produce carbon monoxide (CO) remains economically challenging owing to the lack of an inexpensive, active, highly selective, and stable catalyst. We show that nanocrystalline cubic molybdenum carbide (α-Mo2C), prepared through a facile and scalable route, offers 100% selectivity for CO2reduction to CO while maintaining its initial equilibrium conversion at high space velocity after more than 500 hours of exposure to harsh reaction conditions at 600°C. The combination of operando and postreaction characterization of the catalyst revealed that its high activity, selectivity, and stability are attributable to crystallographic phase purity, weak CO-Mo2C interactions, and interstitial oxygen atoms, respectively. Mechanistic studies and density functional theory (DFT) calculations provided evidence that the reaction proceeds through an H2-aided redox mechanism.
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Rate and selectivity hysteresis during the carbon monoxide hydrogenation over promoted Co/MnOx catalysts
Abstract While cobalt-based catalysts have been used in industrial Fischer-Tropsch synthesis for decades, little is known about how the dynamics of the Co-Co2C phase transformation drive their performance. Here we report on the occurrence of hysteresis effects in the Fischer-Tropsch reaction over potassium promoted Co/MnOxcatalyst. Both the reaction rate and the selectivity to chain-lengthened paraffins and terminally functionalized products (aldehydes, alcohols, olefins) show bistability when varying the hydrogen/carbon monoxide partial pressures back and forth from overall reducing to carbidizing conditions. While the carbon monoxide conversion and the selectivity to functionalized products follow clockwise hysteresis, the selectivity to paraffins shows counter-clockwise behavior. In situ X-ray diffraction demonstrates the activity/selectivity bistability to be driven by a Co-Co2C phase transformation. The conclusions are supported by High Resolution Transmission Electron Microscopy which identifies the Co-Co2C transformation, Mn5O8layered topologies at low H2/CO partial pressure ratios, and MnO at high such ratios.
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- Award ID(s):
- 1438227
- PAR ID:
- 10154024
- Publisher / Repository:
- Nature Publishing Group
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Nature Communications
- Volume:
- 10
- Issue:
- 1
- ISSN:
- 2041-1723
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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