Light-assisted surface reactions using metal catalysts

Abstract

Metal nanoparticle have been intensively used as conventional catalysts in many chemical industries. Most of the catalytic processes supply energy required for the chemical reaction through heat transfer. The initiation of chemical reaction requires energy beyond activation energy, which is higher than the reaction enthalpy. Thus, excessive energy supply is inevitable. In addition, the selective energy transfer to the reactant among components of system including reactor, reaction medium, catalyst etc. is not possible in the energy transfer through thermal conduction and convection. In this regards, the conventional chemical process requires an excessive energy supply over the energy required for the reaction itself, which is leading to high reaction temperature. In this thesis, we design the new catalytic system to lower the reaction temperature by compensating the heat energy required for the chemical reaction with light energy. To this end, Plasmonic catalyst was designed as a new catalyst for effective absorption of light energy and light energy transfer mechanism was studied based on various experimental and theoretical evidence. Based on this understanding, a new type of light energy transfer mechanism that does not require the synthesis of complex catalyst structures through photoexcitation of metal-adsorbate.