Dion Vlachos has
published a paper in Nature Communications showing that a
patched architecture
may yield more effective catalysts than a traditional core-shell structure.
Photo by Kathy F.
Atkinson
(October 7, 2015) In
the world of catalytic science and technology, the hunt is always on for
catalysts that are inexpensive, highly active, and environmentally friendly.
Recent efforts have focused on combining two metals, often
in a structure where a core of one metal is surrounded by an atom-thick layer
of a second one.
The properties and performance of these so-called bimetallic
core-shell catalysts can be superior to those of either of the constituent
metals, but determining how to take advantage of this synergy can be
challenging.
Dion Vlachos, who directs the Catalysis Center for Energy
Innovation at the University of Delaware, uses computational techniques to
predict how these nanoscale materials will behave, and he recently made a
surprising discovery about the structure of bimetallic catalysts.
“We thought that the shell had to form a perfect concentric
circle around the core,” he says. “But it turns out that the apparent
imperfection of a patched surface actually offers better performance and ease
of synthesis.”