Interface Engineering of Gold Nanoclusters for CO Oxidation Catalysis

Catalysts based on atomically precise gold nanoclusters serve as an ideal model to relate the catalytic activity to the geometrical and electronic structures as well as the ligand effect. Herein, we investigate three series of ligand (thiolate)-protected gold nanoclusters, including Au38(SR)24, Au36(SR′)24, and Au25(SR″)18, with a focus on their interface effects using carbon monoxide (CO) oxidation as a probe reaction. The first comparison is within each series, which reveals the same trend for the three series that, rather than the bulkiness of carbon tails as commonly thought, the steric hindrance of ligands at the interface between the thiolate, Au, and CeO2 inhibits CO adsorption onto Au sites and hence adversely affects the activity of CO oxidation. The second comparison is between the sets Au38(SR)24 and Au36(SR′)24 of nearly the same size, which reveals that the Au36(SR′)24 nanoclusters (with face centered cubic structure) are not sensitive to thermal pretreatment conditions, whereas the Au38(SR)24 catalysts (icosahedral structure) are and an optimum activity is observed at a pretreatment temperature of 150 °C. Overall, the atomically precise Aun(SR)m nanoclusters have revealed unprecedented details on the catalytic interface and atomic structure effects. It is hoped that such insights will benefit the ultimate goal of catalysis in future design of enzymelike catalysts for environmentally friendly green catalysis.