Broensted Basicity of Atomic Oxygen on the Au(110) Surface: Reactions with Methanol, Acetylene, Water, and Ethylene

Article abstract of DOI:10.1021/ja00240a018

The adsorption and reactions of methanol, acetylene, water, and ethylene were investigated on clean and oxidized Au(110) surfaces by temperature-programmed reaction spectroscopy.All of these molecules are only weakly and molecularly adsorbed on the clean Au(110) surface.Methanol, acetylene, and water, however, react with the oxidized surface.Methanol, activated by 0.25 monolayer of oxygen adatoms, reacts to form water, methyl formate, hydrogen, and carbon dioxide.A stable methoxy intermediate is identified in these reactions.Acetylene reacts to form water and carbon dioxide, and water is more strongly bonded to the Au(110) surface in the presence of oxygen adatoms.Ethylene is the only one of these molecules which does not react with oxygen adatoms on Au(110).This pattern of reactivity parallels that associated with the acidity of these molecules as measured in the gas phase which has been observed on Cu(110) and Ag(110) surfaces.These results complete the studies necessary to demonstrate the Broensted base character of oxygen adatoms on all of the group 1B metals.