Photoelectrochemical water splitting can produce green hydrogen for industrial use and CO-neutral transportation, ensuring the transition from fossil fuels to green, renewable energy sources. The iron-based electrocatalyst [FeFe(μ-3-O)(μ-)] (H = 3,5-bis(2-pyridyl)pyrazole) , discovered in 2016, is one of the fastest molecular water oxidation catalysts (WOC) based on earth-abundant elements. However, its water oxidation reaction mechanism has not been yet fully elucidated. Here, we present X-ray spectroscopy and electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) analysis of electrochemical water oxidation reaction (WOR) promoted by in water-acetonitrile solution. We observed transient reactive intermediates during the electrochemical WOR, consistent with a coordination sphere expansion prior to the onset of catalytic current. At a pre-catalytic (~+1.1 V . Ag/AgCl) potential, the distinct g~2.0 EPR signal assigned to Fe/Fe interaction was observed. Prolonged bulk electrolysis at catalytic (~+1.6 V . Ag/AgCl) potential leads to the further oxidation of Fe centers in At the steady state achieved with such electrolysis, the formation of hypervalent Fe=O and Fe=O catalytic intermediates was inferred with XANES and EXAFS fitting, detecting a short Fe=O bond at ~1.6 Å. was embedded into MIL-126 MOF with the formation of -MIL-126 composite. The latter was tested in photoelectrochemical WOR and demonstrated an improvement of electrocatalytic current upon visible light irradiation in acidic (pH=2) water solution. The presented spectroscopic analysis gives further insight into the catalytic pathways of multinuclear systems and should help the subsequent development of more energy- and cost-effective catalysts of water splitting based on earth-abundant metals. Photoelectrocatalytic activity of -MIL-126 confirms the possibility of creating an assembly of inside a solid support and boosting it with solar irradiation towards industrial applications of the catalyst.

The development of oxidant-free gold-catalyzed cross coupling reactions involving aryl halides have been hamstrung by the lack of gold catalysts capable of performing oxidative addition at Au(I) centers. Herein, we report the development of novel tricoordinate Au(I) catalysts supported by N,N-bidentate ligands and ligated by phosphine or arsine ligands for C-H functionalization without external oxidants to form biaryls with no homocoupling. The unsymmetrical character of the Au(I) catalyst is critical to facilitating this necessary orthogonal transformation. This study unveils yet another potential of Au(I) catalysis in biaryl synthesis.

Synthetic chiral catalysts generally rely on proximal functional groups or ligands for chiral induction. Enzymes often employ environmental chirality to achieve stereoselectivity. Environmentally controlled catalysis has benefits such as size and shape selectivity but is underexplored by chemists. We here report molecularly imprinted nanoparticles (MINPs) that utilized their environmental chirality to either augment or reverse the intrinsic selectivity of a chiral prolinamide cofactor. The latter ability allowed the catalyst to produce products otherwise disfavored in the conjugate addition of aldehyde to nitroalkene. The catalysis occurred in water at room temperature and afforded γ-nitroaldehydes with excellent yields (up to 94%) and ee (>90% in most cases). Up to 25:1 / and 1:6 / ratios were achieved through a combination of catalyst-derived and environmentally enabled selectivity. The high enantioselectivity of the MINP also made it possible for racemic catalysts to perform asymmetric catalysis, with up to 80% ee for the conjugate addition.

This study reports enhanced current (CE) and energy efficiency (EE) of reactive chlorine species (RCS) generation on IrTaO anode by Ti/Bi mixed metal oxide heterojunction layers despite reductions in pseudo-capacitance and film conductivity. In potentiostatic electrolysis of 50 mM NaCl solutions, dramatic improvement (0.61 mmol cm hr at 2.5 V NHE) was noted by simple coating of thin (~2 μm) TiO layer from ball-milled TiO nanoparticle (80-100 nm) suspension, even with moderate elevation in voltammetric wave. Decoration of BiO particles (1 - 2 μm) showed limited or adverse effects for RCS generation and stability. However, Bi-doped TiO layers prepared from polyol-mediated or co-precipitation methods marked the highest CE (~100%) and EE (8.16 mmol Wh at 2.5 V NHE) by increased mixing level and effective shift in surface charge. Surface ·OH exclusively mediated the RCS generation whose further transformation to higher oxide could be restrained by the heterojunction layer.

Rational catalyst design requires an atomic scale mechanistic understanding of the chemical pathways involved in the catalytic process. A heterogeneous catalyst typically works by adsorbing reactants onto its surface, where the energies for specific bonds to dissociate and/or combine with other species (to form desired intermediate or final products) are lower. Here, using the catalytic growth of single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs) as a prototype reaction, we show that the chemical pathway may in-fact involve the entire catalyst particle, and can proceed via the fluctuations in the formation and decomposition of metastable phases in the particle interior. We record in situ and at atomic resolution, the dynamic phase transformations occurring in a Cobalt catalyst nanoparticle during SWCNT growth, using a state-of-the-art environmental transmission electron microscope (ETEM). The fluctuations in catalyst carbon content are quantified by the automated, atomic-scale structural analysis of the time-resolved ETEM images and correlated with the SWCNT growth rate. We find the fluctuations in the carbon concentration in the catalyst nanoparticle and the fluctuations in nanotube growth rates to be of complementary character. These findings are successfully explained by reactive molecular dynamics (RMD) simulations that track the spatial and temporal evolution of the distribution of carbon atoms within and on the surface of the catalyst particle. We anticipate that our approach combining real-time, atomic-resolution image analysis and molecular dynamics simulations will facilitate catalyst design, improving reaction efficiencies and selectivity towards the growth of desired structure.

Two chiral binuclear copper(II) complexes were synthesized and characterized for the first time as efficient chemoselective catalysts for the hydrolysis of aryl glycosides and disaccharides in aqueous solution at near neutral pH. Under these conditions, discrimination of epimeric aryl -glycopyranosides was observed both by 29-fold different reaction rates and 3-fold different proficiency of the catalyst. Additionally, large differentiation of the nature of - and - glycosidic bond in aryl glycosides as model compounds is apparent, but also noted in selected disaccharides. The influence of the chirality of the complexes and the role of the configuration of the carbohydrate upon interaction with the catalyst is discussed in detail. Lastly, a putative mechanism for the metal complex-catalyzed hydrolysis is derived from the experimental evidence pointing at deprotonation of the hydroxyl group at C-2 as a pre-requisite for glycoside hydrolysis.

The thermal chemistry of β-diketones underlies a number of catalytic processes related both to the catalytic reactions yielding commodity chemicals and to the production of supported transition metal catalysts themselves. The mechanisms of decomposition during thermal transformation of three β-diketones, acetylacetone (acacH), 1,1,1-trifluoroacetylacetone (tfacH), and 1,1,1,5,5,5-hexafluoroacetylacetone (hfacH), were studied on ZnO powder surface using Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), and Density functional theory (DFT) computational investigation. The initial O-H dissociation leads to the formation of corresponding β-diketonates in all the cases investigated. These diketonates are important surface intermediates that can be generated in a controlled manner in these experiments. The presence on the C-CF entity determines the preferred thermal decomposition pathways, as the C-C bond in this group starts to react with a surface of ZnO around 400 K, followed by immediate decomposition of the resulting CF group. Above 600 K, the presence of the CF-substituent leads to the formation of ketene-like structures observed by vibrational spectroscopy. The reaction mechanisms examined with the help of DFT calculations are correlated with vibrational signatures of the species produced and with the F-containing species recorded by XPS.

ZnO was tested as possible methanol and - since formaldehyde is one of the key intermediates in methanol conversion reactions - also as formaldehyde steam reforming catalyst. Catalytic experiments in a batch as well as a flow reactor resulted in highly selective steam reforming, though at low specific activities, of formaldehyde and methanol over ZnO toward CO(2) (selectivity of 95-99.6%). Comparison of the behavior of ZnPd near-surface intermetallic phases, unsupported intermetallic ZnPd and supported ZnPd/ZnO catalysts reveals that formaldehyde is formed from methanol in parallel with CO(2) on the former, while on unsupported intermetallic ZnPd and ZnO-supported ZnPd, it is efficiently reacted toward CO(2), thus, a beneficial role of ZnO in oxidizing formaldehyde-derived intermediates toward CO(2) is evident.

In situ X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (in situ XPS) was used to study the structural and catalytic properties of Pd-In near-surface intermetallic phases in correlation with previously studied PdZn and PdGa.Room temperature deposition of ∼4 monolayer equivalents (MLEs) of In metal on Pd foil and subsequent annealing to 453 K in vacuum yields a ∼1:1 Pd/In near-surface multilayer intermetallic phase. This Pd(1)In(1) phase exhibits a similar "Cu-like" electronic structure and indium depth distribution as its methanol steam reforming (MSR)-selective multilayer Pd(1)Zn(1) counterpart.Catalytic characterization of the multilayer Pd(1)In(1) phase in MSR yielded a CO(2)-selectivity of almost 100% between 493 and 550 K. In contrast to previously studied In(2)O(3)-supported PdIn nanoparticles and pure In(2)O(3), intermediate formaldehyde is only partially converted to CO(2) using this Pd(1)In(1) phase. Strongly correlated with PdZn, on an In-diluted PdIn intermetallic phase with "Pd-like" electronic structure, prepared by thermal annealing at 623 K, methanol steam reforming is suppressed and enhanced CO formation via full methanol dehydrogenation is observed.To achieve CO(2)-TOF values on the isolated Pd(1)In(1) intermetallic phase as high as on supported PdIn/In(2)O(3), at least 593 K reaction temperature is required. A bimetal-oxide synergism, with both bimetallic and oxide synergistically contributing to the observed catalytic activity and selectivity, manifests itself by accelerated formaldehyde-to-CO(2) conversion at markedly lowered temperatures as compared to separate oxide and bimetal. Combination of suppression of full methanol dehydrogenation to CO on Pd(1)In(1) inhibited inverse water-gas-shift reaction on In(2)O(3) and fast water activation/conversion of formaldehyde is the key to the low-temperature activity and high CO(2)-selectivity of the supported catalyst.

In situ X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and low-energy ion scattering were used to study the preparation, (thermo)chemical and catalytic properties of 1:1 PdGa intermetallic near-surface phases. Deposition of several multilayers of Ga metal and subsequent annealing to 503-523 K led to the formation of a multi-layered 1:1 PdGa near-surface state without desorption of excess Ga to the gas phase. In general, the composition of the PdGa model system is much more variable than that of its PdZn counterpart, which results in gradual changes of the near-surface composition with increasing annealing or reaction temperature.In contrast to near-surface PdZn, in methanol steam reforming, no temperature region with pronounced CO(2) selectivity was observed, which is due to the inability of purely intermetallic PdGa to efficiently activate water. This allows to pinpoint the water-activating role of the intermetallic/support interface and/or of the oxide support in the related supported Pd(x)Ga/Ga(2)O(3) systems, which exhibit high CO(2) selectivity in a broad temperature range. In contrast, corresponding experiments starting on the purely bimetallic model surface in oxidative methanol reforming yielded high CO(2) selectivity already at low temperatures (∼460 K), which is due to efficient O(2) activation on PdGa. In situ detected partial and reversible oxidative Ga segregation on intermetallic PdGa is associated with total oxidation of intermediate C(1) oxygenates to CO(2).

The synthesis and characterization of a novel catalytic system including Pd(OAc)(2) attached to a bis(oxazoline) (=BOX) ligand that is covalently bonded to 3-mercaptopropyl-functionalized silica gel is presented. The catalyst was tested for Suzuki-Miyaura reactions of different aryl halides with phenylboronic acid. The heterogeneity of the catalytic system was investigated using different approaches, indicating that there is virtually no Pd leaching into the reaction solution under the applied reaction conditions. Furthermore, our results show that the catalytic system can be reused multiple times without significant loss of stability or structure.

The present work highlights recent advances in elucidating the methane oxidation mechanism of inorganic Cu-ZSM-5 biomimic and in identifying the reactive intermediates that are involved. Such molecular understanding is important in view of upgrading abundantly available methane, but also to comprehend the working mechanism of genuine Cu-containing oxidation enzymes.