The study of the effect of rare earth dopants on the redox properties of ceria-zirconia with application in CO and CH4 oxidation
In this international bilateral cooperative project, we propose to provide the elucidation of the mutual effects of the active metal (Pt, Rh, Pd), the promoter, and the pure and rare-earth doped CZ phase on the redox properties of the Ce4+/Ce3+ and the metal pairs. An important aspect will be the influence of surface and bulk oxygen mobility, modified by rare earth dopants, on the catalytic performance. In a first approach, we will focus on CO and CH4 oxidation as model reactions for suprafacial and intrafacial reactions, involving surface and lattice oxygen as reactive species, respectively. The kinetics of the structural changes followed by the various analytical methods will be compared with the global reaction rate in order to evaluate the relevance of the process captured by spectroscopy/diffraction. The use of analytical methods providing time-resolved information on structural changes under pulsed experimental conditions is a powerful tool compared to conventional characterization under steady-state conditions.