Design of nano-carbide heterogeneous catalysts as substitute for noble metals

The project wishes to develop catalysts based on Transition Metal Carbides (TMC) (mainly Mo or W) which are attractive alternatives to noble metals due to the coexistence of metallic and acidic/oxophilic functionalities from abundant and cost-effective available metals. One of the main difficulties with carbide catalysts is to control their activation (carburization) in order to precisely control the carbide/oxide balance needed for selective hydrogenation and hydrogenolysis. We propose the thorough characterization of the Tungsten catalysts supported on TiO2 and carbon using High-Energy Resolution Fluorescence detected XAS (HERFDXAS) at the W L3 edge during the carburization process for probing the full carbide speciation in severe conditions (high temperature, 700-800°C, and in Methane/hydrogen atmosphere). The High-Temperature in-situ cell available on FAME-UHD beamline will allow us to fully reproduce lab-scale experiments in a broad range of temperatures and atmospheres.