CeO(2) is a catalytic material of exceptional technological importance, and the precise role of oxygen vacancies is crucial to the greater understanding of these oxide materials. In this work, two ceria nanorod samples with different types and distributions of oxygen vacancies were synthesized. A direct relationship between the concentration of the larger size oxygen vacancy clusters and the reducibility/reactivity of nanosized ceria was revealed. These results may be an important step in understanding and designing active sites at the surface of metal oxide catalytic materials.
It is highly challenging but desirable to develop efficient catalysts for the activation of oxygen under mild conditions. Here, we report that various monodispersed metal nanoparticles (Ag, Pt, Co, Cu, Ni, Pd, and Au) efficiently activated molecular oxygen under mild conditions, illustrated by the aerobic oxidation of anilines to form either symmetric or asymmetric aromatic azo compounds. This discovery indicates that exploiting the catalytic power of nanoparticles could enable sustainable chemistry suitable for important oxidation reactions.
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