Developmentof Novel Nanocatalysts for Environmental Applications Using Helium Isolation Method

Nanoparticles (NPs) are revolutionizing many areas of science and technology, often delivering unprecedented improvements to properties of the conventional materials. However, despite important advances in NPs synthesis and applications, numerous challenges still remain. Development of alternative synthetic method capable of producing very uniform, extremely clean and very stable NPs is urgently needed. If successful, such method can potentially transform several areas of nanoscience, including environmental and energy related catalysis. Here we first present the experimental demonstration of catalytically active NPs synthesis achieved by the helium nanodroplet isolation method. This alternative method of NPs fabrication and deposition produces narrowly distributed, clean, and remarkably stable NPs. The fabrication is achieved inside ultra-low temperature, superfluid helium nanodroplets, which can be subsequently deposited onto any substrate. This technique is universal enough to be applied to nearly any element. We then prepared a series of model catalysts by depositing Au NPs on silicon wafers using helium nanodroplet isolation method. Taking the above-mentioned advantages of this method, we were able to study the support effect in catalysis by using these model catalysts.