(655c) Effects of Alloying Pd and Cu on Tandem Dehydrogenation-Aldol Condensation Reactions

The successful reduction of carbon dioxide emissions as a result of the production and consumption of fuels and chemicals requires the use of biomass resources as a feedstock. As a result of this, the discovery of novel pathways to upgrade platform molecules to fuel precursors is of critical importance. More specifically, for the production of diesel substitutes, the formation of new C-C bonds is required, as platform molecules deriving from the acid-catalyzed hydrolysis of biomass or the fermentation thereof are in the C2-C6 carbon range.

In this work, we investigate the upgrade of fermentation-derived acetone-butanol-ethanol mixtures to renewable diesel precursors. To achieve this, we develop a bimetallic Pd-Cu catalyst. We show that alloying of Pd and Cu results in the suppression of undesirable decarbonylation reactions. We present X-ray absorption spectroscopy results showing the segregation of Cu to the catalyst nanoparticle surface. Kinetic measurements under flow conditions demonstrate that Pd-Cu surface ensembles are active for hydrogenation reactions, while Pd-Pd ensembles catalyze C-C bond scission reactions. Density functional theory and microkinetic modeling show that the PdCu ensembles are bind CO fragments weakly, and hence destabilize C-C bond scission transition states. Similarly, the weaker CO binding onto low-index planes compared to stepped surfaces results in higher decarbonylation rates over smaller nanoparticles. Based on these results, we generalize our conclusions for a range of reactions, under oxidizing and reducing conditions, and present the implications of the segregation of alloy components to the catalyst surface on reactivity and selectivity.

References:

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