Size-Dependent Dispersion of Rhodium Clusters into Isolated Single Atoms at Low Temperature and the Consequences for CO Oxidation Activity.

Understanding the dynamic structural evolution of supported metal clusters under reaction conditions is crucial to develop structure reactivity relations. Here, we followed the structure of different size Rh clusters supported on Al2O3 using in situ/operando spectroscopy and ex situ aberration-corrected electron microscopy. We report a dynamic evolution of rhodium clusters into thermally stable isolated single atoms upon exposure to oxygen and during CO oxidation. Rh clusters partially disperse into single atoms at room temperature and the extent of dispersion increases as the Rh size decreases and as the reaction temperature increases. A strong correlation is found between the extent of dispersion and the CO oxidation kinetics. More importantly, dispersing Rh clusters into single atoms increases the activity at room temperature by more than two orders of magnitude due to the much lower activation energy on single atoms (40 vs. 130 kJ/mol). This work demonstrates that the structure and reactivity of small Rh clusters are very sensitive to the reaction environment.