Electrocatalytic mechanism for formaldehyde oxidation on the highly dispersed gold microparticles and the surface characteristics of the electrode

Electrocatalytic mechanism for the electrochemical oxidation of formaldehyde (HCHO) on the highly dispersed Au microparticles electrodeposited on the surface of the glass carbon (GC) electrode in the alkaline Na2CO3/NaHCO3 solution and the surface characteristics of the Au microparticle-modified glass carbon (Au/GC) electrode were studied with in situ FTIR spectroscopy, scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and X-ray diffraction (XRD). It was found that the final products of HCHO oxidation is HCOO- at the Au/GC electrode and CO2 at the bulk Au electrode. The difference may be ascribed to the different surface characteristics between the Au/GC electrode and the bulk Au electrode. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.

Anodic oxidation of formaldehyde on Pt-modified SnO2 thin film electrodes prepared by a sol-gel method

Pt-modified SnO2 electrodes were prepared onto titanium substrates in the form of thin films of similar to2 mum at different temperatures in the range from 200 to 400degreesC. Surface morphology was examined by scanning electron microscopy (SEM). It was found that Pt-SnO2 sol-gel layers are significantly rough and have a low porosity. X-ray diffraction (XRD) studies showed that the films consist of Pt nanoparticles with average size varying from about 5 to 10 nm, depending on the preparation temperature, and amorphous tin oxide. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) was employed to determine the superficial composition of the electrodes and demonstrated the presence of Sn4+ in all the samples. XPS spectra of the Pt 4f electrons showed the presence of Pt in the zero-valence state as well as in ionic forms. The general electrochemical behavior was characterized by cyclic voltammetry in 1 mol l(-1) HClO4 and the electrocatalytic activity towards the oxidation of formaldehyde was investigated by potential sweeps and chronoamperometry. The results obtained show that the Pt-SnO2/Ti system exhibits a significant catalytic activity for the oxidation of formaldehyde, with an onset potential below 0.1 V. (C) 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Influence of oxidation and reduction conditions upon the morphology of silica-supported polycrystalline silver catalysts

The effect of oxidation and reduction conditions upon the morphology of polycrystalline silver catalysts has been investigated by means of in situ Fourier-transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy. Characterization of the sample was achieved by inspection of the νas(COO) band profile of adsorbed formate, recorded after dosing with formic acid at ambient temperature. Evidence was obtained for the existence of a silver surface reconstructed by the presence of subsurface oxygen in addition to the conventional family of Ag(111) and Ag(110) crystal faces. Oxidation at 773 K facilitated the reconstruction of silver planes due to the formation of subsurface oxygen species. Prolonged oxygen treatment at 773 K also caused particle fragmentation as a consequence of excessive oxygen penetration of the silver catalyst at defect sites. It was also deduced that the presence of oxygen in the gas phase stabilized the growth of silver planes which could form stronger bonds with oxygen. In contrast, high-temperature thermal treatment in vacuum induced significant sintering of the silver catalyst. Reduction at 773 K resulted in substantial quantities of dissolved hydrogen (and probably hydroxy species) in the bulk silver structure. Furthermore, enhanced defect formation in the catalyst was also noted, as evidenced by the increased concentration of formate species associated with oxygen-reconstructed silver faces.

The dual pathway in action: decoupling parallel routes for CO2 production during the oscillatory electro-oxidation of methanol

As in the case of most small organic molecules, the electro-oxidation of methanol to CO2 is believed to proceed through a so-called dual pathway mechanism. The direct pathway proceeds via reactive intermediates such as formaldehyde or formic acid, whereas the indirect pathway occurs in parallel, and proceeds via the formation of adsorbed carbon monoxide (COad). Despite the extensive literature on the electro-oxidation of methanol, no study to date distinguished the production of CO2 from direct and indirect pathways. Working under, far-from-equilibrium, oscillatory conditions, we were able to decouple, for the first time, the direct and indirect pathways that lead to CO2 during the oscillatory electro-oxidation of methanol on platinum. The CO2 production was followed by differential electrochemical mass spectrometry and the individual contributions of parallel pathways were identified by a combination of experiments and numerical simulations. We believe that our report opens some perspectives, particularly as a methodology to be used to identify the role played by surface modifiers in the relative weight of both pathways-a key issue to the effective development of catalysts for low temperature fuel cells.

Oscillatory electro-oxidation of glycerol on platinum

This paper describes the experimental study of the oscillatory electro-oxidation of glycerol on platinum under galvanostatic control. The system was investigated in both acidic and alkaline media and for different glycerol concentrations. In acidic supporting electrolyte, the oscillatory behavior is rather simple and the main features such as period, amplitude and waveform are barely affected by the glycerol concentration. A more complex picture including the presence of different temporal patterns and strong dependence with glycerol concentration emerges in alkaline medium. In both media, the composite oscillations visit two clearly discernible potential windows, and potential oscillations in alkaline media are observed only when the working electrode is kept stationary. The mechanistic implications of our findings are discussed in connection with available data obtained under close-to-equilibrium conditions. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

替代燃料二甲醚的燃烧特性及其污染物甲醛的生成消耗机理研究

化石燃料的不可再生性决定了其不能长久为全球经济和科技的发展提供能源动力，从可持续发展和能源战略的角度考虑，能够替代石油及其衍生品的清洁替代燃料研究已经成为提高能源供应安全、改善环境污染问题、应对气候变化的重要措施，对替代燃料的研究和应用已经成为各方关注和开发的热点。 二甲醚(DME、CH3OCH3)是一种最简单的醚类，它不含C-C健，可以由天然气、煤、生物质燃料等大量制备，而且具有较高的辛烷值(55-60)，较低的碳氢化合物、CO排放，没有PM排放，因而被认为是一种非常有发展前景的发动机替代燃料，已经受到了广泛的关注。但是，在发动机燃用DME的实验研究表明，在其排气中有非常规污染物甲醛(HCHO)、乙醛(CH3CHO)，甲酸甲酯(HCOOCH3)等排放，这些有机污染物会对环境和人类健康产生严重的危害，在环保要求日益严格的趋势下，这就制约了二甲醚的规模化应用。因此，对二甲醚燃烧性能、氧化中间产物甲醛等的产生和排放机理、相关污染物抑制技术需要进行着重研究，这对二甲醚燃料规模化应用、相关二甲醚燃烧器设计、燃烧性能的优化以及污染物控制技术的研究等都有着重要的理论指导意义和参考价值。 为了充分理解二甲醚燃料的燃烧特性、非常规污染物甲醛的产生和消耗机理，本文以实验和二甲醚化学反应动力学机理为指导，对二甲醚预混燃烧的燃烧特性、相关污染物和甲醛产生和消耗的机理做了详细的研究；并针对二甲醚燃料的不同应用背景，对二甲醚燃料低温下的氧化和甲醛生成特性、DME与LPG掺混燃烧特性和甲醛生成消耗机理进行了深入的研究，具体工作有： 研究了二甲醚预混燃烧特性、火焰中甲醛等污染物的产生特性，建立了火焰中甲醛取样、测量的方法和实验平台。并对当量比和燃料流量对二甲醚预混燃烧的燃烧特性、甲醛生成特性影响进行了考察，实验结果表明二甲醚是一种优良的替代燃料，在二甲醚火焰中甲醛是其重要的中间产物，甲醛浓度分布与当量比和预混气流速密切相关。当量比一定时，随着预混气流速的增加，火焰中甲醛产生的范围变窄，且甲醛浓度峰值逐渐移向燃烧器出口，而甲醛产生的浓度峰值数值上相差不大，甲醛在形成峰值后被快速消耗，其浓度在0.1mm内下降到几乎为零；在二甲醚流量一定时，随着当量比的增加，火焰中产生了更多的甲醛，火焰中甲醛分布的范围也变宽，而且当量比越大，甲醛的消耗也变缓，在当量比为0.8时，甲醛浓度从峰值到被消耗距离变为2mm，远大于当量比0.6和0.7下0.1mm的消耗距离。 对二甲醚预混燃烧进行数值研究和化学动力反应机理分析后发现，在二甲醚燃烧中，二甲醚的氧化反应途径主要是通过脱氢生成CH3OCH2和在高温下的直接裂解反应而进行，其中脱氢反应是低温下二甲醚消耗的主要途径，而在高温反应阶段(T>1000K)，DME的直接裂解和燃料的脱氢反应共同起主导作用；非常规污染物甲醛通过DME脱氢产物CH3OCH2的裂解和外部氧化而生成，在高温时通过DME直接裂解后被氧化产生；甲醛的消耗反应则是通过与H、O、OH和CH3基的氧化反应而完成，其中与O、OH基的反应在燃烧中起主要作用。因此二甲醚燃烧中甲醛的抑制关键在燃烧中甲醛的消耗阶段，采取有效的技术措施，如优化燃烧器结构提高二甲醚燃烧室内的温度、在燃烧区保证充足的氧气供应等措施，加快甲醛的消耗速度以促进其被完全氧化，可以实现二甲醚燃烧中甲醛的零排放。 针对柴油发动机燃用DME燃料时，燃料在燃烧室停留时间过短，造成部分未燃二甲醚随尾气排放，对DME在低温下(<800K)的氧化特性和甲醛生成特性进行了实验研究。结果表明，二甲醚在200℃左右就开始发生氧化反应，在200~400℃温度范围内被氧化而生成大量中间产物甲醛，且在此温度范围内甲醛不易被氧化分解，而发动机尾气温度（一般在200~600℃之间）处于甲醛最易生成的范围，因此未燃二甲醚在尾气中发生低温氧化反应生成的甲醛，是发动机燃用DME而排放高浓度甲醛的重要来源。研究结论为柴油发动机燃用DME抑制非常规污染物甲醛的排放提供了新的参考。 DME作为替代燃料，部分替代及与其他石化系燃料掺混燃烧是目前的重要应用方向，对DME与LPG掺混燃烧特性和甲醛生成特性进行了实验研究，结果表明，在DME与LPG掺混燃烧中，固定当量比和燃料质量流量的条件下，两种燃料存在一个最佳掺混比，在此掺混比例下，混合燃料着火提前，燃料燃烧性能最佳；DME与LPG混合燃料中，二甲醚是燃烧中甲醛产生的主要来源，控制DME的完全氧化和燃烧是抑制DME与LPG掺混燃烧排放甲醛的主要途径，这为更好地应用DME与LPG混合燃料提供了参考。 能否清洁高效燃烧是决定替代燃料DME应用规模和途径中的关键任务，本文对DME燃烧特性、非常规污染物甲醛的生成排放特性、低温下DME的氧化特性、DME与LPG掺混燃烧特性的研究，从不用的应用方向和领域对DME清洁高效燃烧进行了探讨和研究，研究成果可以为清洁高效利用二甲醚、抑制甲醛排放，以及开发相关燃烧技术、燃烧器提供实验依据和理论指导。本文在DME燃烧特性和非常规污染物甲醛的产生与排放方面取得了具有创新性的研究结果。

Stabilizing Nonstationary Electrochemical Time Series

Electrochemical systems are ideal working-horses for studying oscillatory dynamics. Experimentally obtained time series, however, are usually associated with a spontaneous drift in some uncontrollable parameter that triggers transitions among different oscillatory patterns, despite the fact that all controllable parameters are kept constant. Herein we present an empirical method to stabilize experimental potential time series. The method consists of applying a negative galvanodynamic sweep to compensate the spontaneous drift and was tested for the oscillatory electro-oxidation of methanol on platinum. For a wide range of applied currents, the base system presents spontaneous transitions from quasi-harmonic to mixed mode oscillations. Temporal patterns were stabilized by galvanodynamic sweeps at different rates. The procedure resulted in a considerable increase in the number of oscillatory cycles from 5 to 20 times, depending on the specific temporal pattern. The spontaneous drift has been associated with uncompensated oscillations, in which the coverage of some adsorbed species are not reestablished after one cycle; i.e., there is a net accumulation and/or depletion of adsorbed species during oscillations. We interpreted the rate of the galvanodynamic sweep in terms of the time scales of the poisoning processes that underlies the uncompensated oscillations and thus the spontaneous slow drift.

In situ Raman studies of the selective oxidation of methanol to formaldehyde and ethene to ethylene oxide on a polycrystalline silver catalyst

The combined techniques of in situ Raman microscopy and scanning electron microscopy (SEM) have been used to study the selective oxidation of methanol to formaldehyde and the ethene epoxidation reaction over polycrystalline silver catalysts. The nature of the oxygen species formed on silver was found to depend critically upon the exact morphology of the catalyst studied. Bands at 640, 780 and 960 cm-1 were identified only on silver catalysts containing a significant proportion of defects. These peaks were assigned to subsurface oxygen species situated in the vicinity of surface dislocations, AgIII=O sites formed on silver atoms modified by the presence of subsurface oxygen and O2 - species stabilized on subsurface oxygen-modified silver sites, respectively. The selective oxidation of methanol to formaldehyde was determined to occur at defect sites, where reaction of methanol with subsurface oxygen initially produced subsurface OH species (451 cm-1) and adsorbed methoxy species. Two distinct forms of adsorbed ethene were identified on oxidised silver sites. One of these was created on silver sites modified by the interaction of subsurface oxygen species, and the other on silver crystal planes containing a surface coverage of atomic oxygen species. The selective oxidation of ethene to ethylene oxide was achieved by the reaction between ethene adsorbed on modified silver sites and electrophilic AgIII=O species, whereas the combustion reaction was perceived to take place by the reaction of adsorbed ethene with nucleophilic surface atomic oxygen species. Defects were determined to play a critical role in the epoxidation reaction, as these sites allowed the rapid diffusion of oxygen into subsurface positions, and consequently facilitated the formation of the catalytically active AgIII=O sites.