Manganese oxidation states repartition in a channel-like mesoporous zirconium oxide

Abstract

Here, we present a characterization of mesoporous mixed manganese zirconium oxide (MnZr) synthesized by evaporation induced self-assembly method involving a block copolymer self-assembly method. The MnZr oxide has been fully characterized by X-ray diffraction, transmission electronic microscopy, analytical electronic tomography, nitrogen adsorption/desorption isotherms, thermogravimetric analysis, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and electronic paramagnetic resonance. Electronic tomography analysis reveals that a mesoporous solid solution MnZr was successfully obtained by this way, with a homogeneous dispersion of Mn. X-ray diffraction, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, thermal analysis and electronic paramagnetic resonance inform about the manganese oxidation states present (Mn2+, Mn3+, Mn4+) and their location within the sample.