A novel nanoengineered VOx catalyst supported on highly ordered TiO2 nanotube arrays for partial oxidation reactions Original Research Article

A new class of nanoengineered partial oxidation catalyst has been prepared through the use of chemical vapor deposition of a vanadium oxide precursor over a highly ordered TiO2 nanotube array. A battery of characterization techniques including X-ray diffraction (XRD) together with scanning electron microscopy (SEM), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), Raman, and DRS-UV/vis indicate that the vanadia species are extremely well dispersed onto the surface of the nanotube array. Studies of the catalytic activity of this material were performed using the partial oxidation of ethanol as a probe reaction and compared with those obtained using typical P-25 TiO2 powdered support. Results showed that the nanoengineered approach to catalyst fabrication leads to a highly active catalytic material where most of the vanadium oxide phase is located on the surface and accessible for catalysis.