Newly-developed alternate on-off gas injection method for investigation of reduction of gas-phase cobalt oxide clusters by CO at high temperature

An alternate on-off gas injection method was newly developed in combination with gas phase thermal desorption spectrometry, which was applied to reveal the reduction of gas-phase cobalt oxide clusters, ConOm+, by carbon monoxide, CO, under thermalized conditions at variable temperatures. Co2O1+ and Co2O3+ were found to be reduced by CO, accompanied by the formation of CO2, Co2O1+ + CO -> Co2++ CO2, and Co2O3+ + CO -> Co2++ CO2 + O2 at high temperature. This method enables to identify evidently a pair of reactant and product species in the reduction of gas-phase metal oxide clusters.