Probing coke formation during the methanol-to-hydrocarbon reaction on zeolite ZSM-5 catalyst at the nanoscale using tip-enhanced fluorescence microscopy

Siiri Bienz, Sophie H van Vreeswijk, Yashashwa Pandey, Giovanni Luca Bartolomeo, Bert M Weckhuysen*, Renato Zenobi*, Naresh Kumar*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleAcademicpeer-review

Abstract

The deactivation mechanism of the widely used zeolite ZSM-5 catalysts remains unclear to date due to the lack of analytical techniques with sufficient sensitivity and/or spatial resolution. Herein, a combination of hyperspectral confocal fluorescence microscopy (CFM) and tip-enhanced fluorescence (TEFL) microscopy is used to study the formation of different coke (precursor) species involved in the deactivation of zeolite ZSM-5 during the methanol-to-hydrocarbon (MTH) reaction. CFM submicron-scale imaging shows a preferential formation of graphite-like coke species at the edges of zeolite ZSM-5 crystals within 10 min of the MTH reaction ( i.e., working catalyst), whilst the amount of graphite-like coke species uniformly increased over the entire zeolite ZSM-5 surface after 90 min ( i.e., deactivated catalyst). Furthermore, TEFL nanoscale imaging with ∼35 nm spatial resolution revealed that formation of coke species on the zeolite ZSM-5 surface is non-uniform and a relatively larger amount of coke is formed at the crystal steps, indicating a higher initial catalytic activity.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)5795-5801
Number of pages7
JournalCatalysis Science & Technology
Volume12
Issue number19
Early online date9 Sept 2022
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 9 Sept 2022

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 The Royal Society of Chemistry.

Funding

Authors acknowledge financial support from European Union through ERC grant no. 741431 (2D Nano-Spec). B. M. W. is supported by the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) in the frame of a Gravitation Program, MCEC (Netherlands Center for Multiscale Catalytic Energy Conversion), as well as from the Advanced Research Center (ARC) Chemical Buildings Blocks Consortium (CBBC), a public-private research consortium in the Netherlands ( arc-cbbc.nl ). Dr. Özgün Attila and Dr. Laurens Mandemaker from Utrecht University and Cedric Wüthrich from ETH Zurich are thanked for useful scientific discussions. Authors acknowledge financial support from European Union through ERC grant no. 741431 (2D Nano-Spec). B. M. W. is supported by the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) in the frame of a Gravitation Program, MCEC (Netherlands Center for Multiscale Catalytic Energy Conversion), as well as from the Advanced Research Center (ARC) Chemical Buildings Blocks Consortium (CBBC), a public-private research consortium in the Netherlands (arc-cbbc.nl). Dr. Özgün Attila and Dr. Laurens Mandemaker from Utrecht University and Cedric Wüthrich from ETH Zurich are thanked for useful scientific discussions.

FundersFunder number
Advanced Research Center
Chemical Buildings Blocks Consortium
MCEC
Netherlands Center for Multiscale Catalytic Energy Conversion
European Commission
European Research Council741431
Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule Zürich
Nederlandse Organisatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek

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