DFT study of selective hydrogenation of acetylene to ethylene on Pd doping Ag nanoclusters

Abstract

Recently, it has been reported that the reaction selectivity of catalytic hydrogenation of acetylene to ethylene can be significantly enhanced via the approach of Pd mono-atomic catalysis [Pei et al. ACS Catal. 5 (2015) 3717–3725]. To explain the catalytic mechanism of this binary alloy catalyst, C2H2 hydrogenation reactions on Pd doping Ag nanoclusters are studied using density functional theory simulations. The simulation results indicate that H2 and C2H2 can simultaneously bind with a single Pd doping atom no matter it is on vertex and edge sites of Ag clusters. The following H2 dissociation and C2H2 hydrogenation are not difficult since the corresponding reaction barrier values are no more than 0.58eV. The generated C2H4 molecule can not be further hydrogenated since it locates on the top of Pd doping atom, which is the only adsorption site for H2. On two Pd doping atoms at contiguous sites of Ag clusters, C2H4 hydrogenation reactions can be carried out since there are enough sites for co-adsorption of H2 and C2H4.