Photo-induced Surface Chemistry on Catalytic Nanoclusters

催化剂技术占美国经济收入的1万亿美元以上，应用范围从药物和替代能源燃料电池到新的和创新的服装纤维的开发。然而，对于许多催化系统来说，决定这些催化过程如何和为什么发生的基本化学和物理仍然很大程度上是未知的。在最小的水平上理解这些催化体系是现代化学的一个目标，因为研究组成部分可能会导致更好地理解大块材料。通过研究催化系统的纳米团簇，我们可以基本上监控它们的化学和物理性质的演变，因为我们一次建立一个原子的块状材料。当然，在许多情况下，已经发现纳米团簇表现出与体相和原子成分完全不同的极端和意想不到的化学和物理性质。发现和应用这些性质是纳米技术领域的一个主要主题。

Catalyst technologies account for over $1 trillion of revenue in the U.S. economy, and applications range from medicines and alternative energy fuel cells to the development of new and innovative clothing fibres. The underlying chemistry and physics that dictates how and why these catalytic processes occur, however, remains largely unknown for many catalytic systems. Understanding these catalytic systems on the smallest level is a goal of modern chemistry, since studying the constituent pieces may lead to a better understanding of bulk materials. By investigating nanoclusters of catalytic systems we can essentially monitor the evolution of their chemical and physical properties as we build up to bulk material an atom at a time. Of course, in many instances nanoclusters have been found to exhibit extreme and unexpected chemical and physical properties quite dissimilar from both the bulk phase and the atomic constituents. Discovering and applying these properties is a major theme in the field of nanotechnology.