Interactions among supported copper-based catalyst components and their effects on performance: A review

Supported copper-based catalysts are widely used in many industrial processes because of their excellent catalytic performance and low cost. Understanding the interactions among the various components of these catalysts is an important step in exploring the nature of the catalytic reactions and provides a valuable scientific basis for the design of novel and efficient catalysts. This review summarizes a number of our recent results in this field. In this work, copper oxide was loaded on CeO2, CexZr1-xO2, and MoO3-CeO2 supports to produce model catalysts. Investigations involving these materials demonstrated that the dispersion of copper oxide on the surface of the oxide supports, as well as some of the properties of these catalysts, can be explained on the basis of the incorporation model, which we have previously proposed. Based on spectroscopic characterization of these catalysts and examination of their catalytic performance for the oxidation of CO or the selective catalytic reduction of NO with CO/NH3, the relationships among the compositions, structures, and properties of these catalysts are discussed. (C) 2013, Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.