From: Andy Soos, ENN
Published June 11, 2013 05:32 PM

Dancing Atoms

Everything is in near constant movement even if it cannot be seen by the naked eye. Just the right movement can cause things like chemical reactions to happen. Catalysts can stop working when atoms on the surface start moving. At the Vienna University of Technology, this dance of the atoms could now be observed and explained.



Atoms on iron-oxide surfaces behave in a similar way to people finding a dance partner: Only with the right molecular partner do they move across the surface and find other suitable partners.

Scientists at the Vienna University of Technology have now filmed the actual atoms, proving that carbon monoxide is the atomic/molecule partner responsible for the motion. Their movies show that the motion leads directly to clustering — an effect that can do great harm in catalysts. The findings have now been published in the journal Nature Materials.




With the new possibility of watching clustering in real-time under the microscope, the mechanisms can now be studied in detail by actually watching the atoms move and react: "We discovered that OH groups on the surface can suppress the clustering effect", says Gareth Parkinson. If the carbon monoxide-palladium couples do not encounter each other, but instead find an OH group, they get trapped there and cannot form a cluster. A hydroxyl coating of the surface could therefore lead to a significant improvement of the stability of catalysts.

For further information see Atoms.

Molecule image via Wikipedia.

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