| Abstract Scope |
Precious metals are broadly used in the production of chemicals and energy carriers, for environmental remediation, and for developing a sustainable chemical industry. During a catalytic reaction, ultra-small particles of precious metals, dispersed onto high-surface-area and robust support materials, can aggregate to form larger particles, leading to inefficient use of expensive precious metals such as Pt, Pd, Rh, and Ir. This work describes the use of ultra-small metal oxide nanoglues, grafted onto high-surface-area silica support, to prevent sintering of metal atoms/clusters and simultaneously to provide the required functionalities for highly active catalysts. The design of such nanoscale, functional architectures can be broadly applied to developing a plethora of stable single-atom and cluster catalysts for transformations of important molecules, demonstrating functional nanomaterials at the single atom limit. |