ChemInform Abstract: The Bond-Order Conservation Approach to Chemisorption and Heterogeneous Catalysis: Applications and Implications

Abstract

Publisher Summary For chemisorption phenomena on transition metal surfaces, including surface reactivity, the bond-order conservation-Morse potential (BOC-MP) model appears to provide such a framework in which the intricacies of real phenomena are coherently interrelated. The BOC-MP model is a simple, truly “back-of-the-envelope’’ model that can be directly used by practitioners in the field. It efficiently describes and interrelates a wide variety of chemisorption phenomena. Most important, the model maps out metal surface reactions providing insight into both regularities and details. In principle, any metal surface reaction can be treated this way. The only requirement is to retain the rigor and simplicity of the model projections. This analytic model proved to be efficient for treating energetics of atomic and diatomic adsorbates on transition metal surfaces, particularly, the heat of chemisorption and activation barriers for dissociation and recombination. Recently, the BOC-MP model has been extended to treat energetics of polyatomic adsorbates as well, which made it possible to analyze mechanisms of catalytic heterogeneous reactions of practical importance. The chapter surveys major applications and implications of BOC-MP modeling to chemisorption and heterogeneous catalysis.