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Updated: May 23, 2026

Multiscale Sampling of a Heterogeneous Water/Metal Catalyst Interface using Density Functional Theory and Force-Field Molecular Dynamics
Published on: April 12, 2019
New insight into mechanisms in water-gas-shift reaction on Au/CeO2(111): a density functional theory and kinetic
Ying Chen1, Haifeng Wang, Robbie Burch
1School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, The Queen's University of Belfast, Belfast BT9 5AG, UK.
Abstract:
Using density functional theory (DFT) and kinetic analyses, a new carboxyl mechanism for the water-gas-shift reaction (WGSR) on Au/CeO2(111) is proposed. Many elementary steps in the WGSR are studied using an Au cluster supported on CeO2(111). It is found that (i) water can readily dissociate at the interface between Au and CeO2; (ii) CO2 can be produced via two steps: adsorbed CO on the Au cluster reacts with active OH on ceria to form the carboxyl (COOH) species and then COOH reacts with OH to release CO2; and (iii) two adsorbed H atoms recombine to form molecular H2 on the Au cluster. Our kinetic analyses show that the turnover frequency of the carboxyl mechanism is consistent with the experimental one while the rates of redox and formate mechanisms are much slower than that of carboxyl mechanism. It is suggested that the carboxyl pathway is likely to be responsible for WGSR on Au/CeO2.
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