1997/12/12 by J. Wintterlin, S. Völkening, Ton V. W. Janssens +2 · 3 citations
Chemical Engineering · Chemistry · Earth and Planetary Sciences · Materials Science · #Adsorption #Atomic oxygen #Carbon monoxide #Catalysis #Catalysis and Oxidation Reactions #Catalytic Processes in Materials Science #Chemical kinetics #Chemical physics #Chemical reaction #Chemistry #Kinetic energy #Kinetics #Materials science #Molecule #Nanotechnology #Organic chemistry #Oxygen #Physical chemistry #Physics #Platinum #Rate equation #Reaction rate #Scanning tunneling microscope #nanoparticles nucleation surface interactions
paper · doi:10.1126/science.278.5345.1931
openalex publication_date 1997/12/12 · openalex created_date 2016/06/24 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/23
The catalytic oxidation of carbon monoxide (CO) on a platinum (111) surface was studied by scanning tunneling microscopy. The adsorbed oxygen atoms and CO molecules were imaged with atomic resolution, and their reactions to carbon dioxide (CO2) were monitored as functions of time. The results allowed the formulation of a rate law that takes the distribution of the reactants in separate domains into account. From temperature-dependent measurements, the kinetic parameters were obtained. Their values agree well with data from macroscopic measurements. In this way, a kinetic description of a chemical reaction was achieved that is based solely on the statistics of the underlying atomic processes.