Enhanced photocatalytic activation of methane C-H bond by Incorporate Cerium into ETS-10

TL;DR

This study demonstrates that incorporating cerium into ETS-10 enhances its photocatalytic ability to convert methane under visible light by improving charge separation through a novel heterojunction mechanism.

Contribution

The paper introduces a new cerium-modified ETS-10 catalyst that significantly improves methane photocatalytic conversion via a unique charge separation mechanism.

Findings

Cerium modification induces visible light photovoltage.

Enhanced charge-hole separation improves methane conversion.

The heterojunction mechanism is highly efficient at atomic scale.

Abstract

Ce-ETS-10 was prepared and their ability on photocatalysis coupling of methane has been studied in detail. Ce modification enhanced the photocatalysis performance of ETS-10 on methane conversion reaction, and the methane conversion can be carried out under irradiation of visible light. To study the various rare earth modification to ETS-10, various rare earth elements were introduced to ETS-10 molecular sieve, and the relative photocatalytic methane conversion performance were studied. Various characterizations were applied to examine rare earth modification behavior. The SPS results show that the Cerium modification induce visible light photovoltage, which means the strong electron-hole separation which enhance the photocatalytic performance. The charge-hole separation is non-traditional n-n heterojunction for the charge-hole separation is highly oriented and efficient at atomic scale. This mechanism shows significant enhancement for methane conversion reaction.