Excess Charge Localization Research Articles

Role of Polarons in Single-Atom Catalysts: Case Study of Me1 [Au1, Pt1, and Rh1] on TiO2(110)

The local environment of metal-oxide supported single-atom catalysts plays a decisive role in the surface reactivity and related catalytic properties. The study of such systems is complicated by the presence of point defects on the surface, which are often associated with the localization of excess charge in the form of polarons. This can affect the stability, the electronic configuration, and the local geometry of the adsorbed adatoms. In this work, through the use of density functional theory and surface-sensitive experiments, we study the adsorption of Rh1, Pt1, and Au1 metals on the reduced TiO2(110) surface, a prototypical polaronic material. A systematic analysis of the adsorption configurations and oxidation states of the adsorbed metals reveals different types of couplings between adsorbates and polarons. As confirmed by scanning tunneling microscopy measurements, the favored Pt1 and Au1 adsorption at oxygen vacancy sites is associated with a strong electronic charge transfer from polaronic states to adatom orbitals, which results in a reduction of the adsorbed metal. In contrast, the Rh1 adatoms interact weakly with the excess charge, which leaves the polarons largely unaffected. Our results show that an accurate understanding of the properties of single-atom catalysts on oxide surfaces requires a careful account of the interplay between adatoms, vacancy sites, and polarons.

Facet-dependent stability of near-surface oxygen vacancies and excess charge localization at CeO2 surfaces

To study the dependence of the relative stability of surface (V A ) and subsurface (VB ) oxygen vacancies with the crystal facet of CeO2, the reduced (100), (110) and (111) surfaces, with two different concentrations of vacancies, were investigated by means of density functional theory (DFT + U) calculations. The results show that the trend in the near-surface vacancy formation energies for comparable vacancy spacings, i.e. (110) < (100) < (111), does not follow the one in the surface stability of the facets, i.e. (111) < (110) < (100). The results also reveal that the preference of vacancies for surface or subsurface sites, as well as the preferred location of the associated Ce3+ polarons, are facet- and concentration-dependent. At the higher vacancy concentration, the V A is more stable than the V B at the (110) facet whereas at the (111), it is the other way around, and at the (100) facet, both the V A and the VB have similar stability. The stability of the V A vacancies, compared to that of the V B , is accentuated as the concentration decreases. Nearest neighbor polarons to the vacant sites are only observed for the less densely packed (110) and (100) facets. These findings are rationalized in terms of the packing density of the facets, the lattice relaxation effects induced by vacancy formation and the localization of the excess charge, as well as the repulsive Ce3+−Ce3+ interactions.

The Structure of Oxygen Vacancies in the Near-Surface of Reduced CeO2 (111) Under Strain

Strain has been widely recognized as important for tuning the behavior of defects in metal oxides since properties such as defect configuration, electronic structure, excess charge localization, and local atomic distortions may be affected by surface strain. In CeO2, the most widely used promoter in three-way catalysts and solid state electrolyte in fuel cells, the behaviors of oxygen vacancies, and associated Ce3+ polarons are crucial in applications. Recent STM and AFM investigations as well as DFT-based calculations have indicated that in the near-surface of CeO2 (111), at low temperatures and vacancy concentrations, subsurface oxygen vacancies are more stable than surface ones, and the Ce3+ ions are next-nearest neighbors to both types of vacancies, which can be explained by the better ability of the system to relax the lattice strain induced by vacancy formation as well as by the excess charge localization. The results also revealed that the interaction between first-neighbor vacancies is repulsive. In this work, the relative stability of surface and subsurface oxygen vacancies at the CeO2 (111) surface under in-plane strain is investigated by means of DFT+U calculations. The tensile strain favors isolated surface vacancies with next nearest neighbor polarons, whereas isolated subsurface vacancies with nearest neighbor polarons are energetically favored under compressive strain. In addition, the formation of both surface and subsurface dimers is favored over having corresponding isolated species under compressive strain, which implies the possibility of controlling the formation of vacancy clusters using strain. In many applications, ceria is employed as a supported thin film or within a heterostructure in which ceria can be strained, and this study shows that strain can be a useful handle to tune properties of such materials.

Dynamics of an excess hole in the 1-methyl-1-butyl-pyrrolidinium dicyanamide ionic-liquid.

In a set of recent publications [C. J. Margulis et al., J. Am. Chem. Soc. 133, 20186 (2011); C. H. Xu et al., J. Am. Chem. Soc. 135, 17528 (2013); C. H. Xu and C. J. Margulis, J. Phys. Chem. B 119, 532 (2015); and K. B. Dhungana et al., J. Phys. Chem. B 121, 8809 (2017)], we explored for selected ionic liquids the early stages of excess charge localization and reactivity relevant both to electrochemical and radiation chemistry processes. In particular, Xu and Margulis [J. Phys. Chem. B 119, 532 (2015)] explored the dynamics of an excess electron in 1-methyl-1-butyl-pyrrolidinium dicyanamide. When electrons are produced from an ionic liquid, the more elusive hole species are also generated. Depending on the nature of cations and anions and the relative alignment of their electronic states in the condensed phase, the very early hole species can nominally be neutral radicals-if the electron is generated from anions-or doubly charged radical cations if their origin is from cations. However, in reality early excess charge localization is more complex and often involves more than one ion. The dynamics and the transient spectroscopy of the hole are the main objects of this study. We find that in the case of 1-methyl-1-butyl-pyrrolidinium dicyanamide, it is the anions that can most easily lose an electron becoming radical species, and that hole localization is mostly on anionic nitrogen. We also find that the driving force for localization of an excess hole appears to be smaller than that for an excess electron in 1-methyl-1-butyl-pyrrolidinium dicyanamide. The early transient hole species can absorb light in the visible, ultraviolet, and near infrared regions, and we are able to identify the type of states being connected by these transitions.

Water network-mediated, electron-induced proton transfer in [C5H5N ⋅ (H2O)n](-) clusters.

The role of proton-assisted charge accommodation in electron capture by a heterocyclic electron scavenger is investigated through theoretical analysis of the vibrational spectra of cold, gas phase [Py ⋅ (H2O)n=3-5](-) clusters. These radical anions are formed when an excess electron is attached to water clusters containing a single pyridine (Py) molecule in a supersonic jet ion source. Under these conditions, the cluster ion distribution starts promptly at n = 3, and the photoelectron spectra, combined with vibrational predissociation spectra of the Ar-tagged anions, establish that for n > 3, these species are best described as hydrated hydroxide ions with the neutral pyridinium radical, PyH((0)), occupying one of the primary solvation sites of the OH(-). The n = 3 cluster appears to be a special case where charge localization on Py and hydroxide is nearly isoenergetic, and the nature of this species is explored with ab initio molecular dynamics calculations of the trajectories that start from metastable arrangements of the anion based on a diffuse, essentially dipole-bound electron. These calculations indicate that the reaction proceeds via a relatively slow rearrangement of the water network to create a favorable hydration configuration around the water molecule that eventually donates a proton to the Py nitrogen atom to yield the product hydroxide ion. The correlation between the degree of excess charge localization and the evolving shape of the water network revealed by this approach thus provides a microscopic picture of the "solvent coordinate" at the heart of a prototypical proton-coupled electron transfer reaction.

Simulation of the sea of electrons in metals using three-dimensional cell-by-cell automation

A 3D cellular automation discretely moves electrons in a metal according to combined thermal and electrical driving forces by including all of the metal cations and all of the loosely bound electrons comprising the sea of electrons to compute the local electric fields. This cell-by-cell automation is asynchronous, acting on individual species sequentially with immediate neighborhood updates, thereby capturing the outcomes of temporally sparse thermally activated events. Calculations are carried out in a personal computer using the graphics processing unit to efficiently update the electric fields. A population of electron and missing-electron pairs is created to allow the metal to generate a dynamic equilibrium distribution of moving charge at each electron site that is then responsible for creating appropriate fields and potentials while simultaneously maintaining local charge neutrality. Examples are given to show that the simulation produces the expected zero fields inside conductors, the expected localization of excess charge of either sign on the surface of a conductor, and the expected equipotential inside a metal. Exterior fields caused by excess charge are consistent with Gauss’s law and excess charge accumulates at sharp corners. Surface relaxation of the lattice of cation and electron sites thought to occur at free surfaces appears to be required to enable a zero equipotential in a zero net charge system. The possibility that these relaxations create an electric double layer within the metal that is needed to terminate the effect of the periodic array of cations is under consideration. The approach is useful to examine interactions between electrons in metals and ions in solution expected during interfacial electrochemistry, but may have deeper implications on the origin of the equations governing electrostatics by linking them to localized 1/r2 Coulomb interactions.

Proton-Electrostatics Hypothesis for Localized Proton Coupling Bioenergetics

According to the proton-electrostatics localization hypothesis presented in this work, protons injected into a thylakoid may be electrostatically localized at the water-membrane interface along the lumenal surface. This hypothesis provides a natural frame work to explain a wide range of experimental observations in the bioenergetics of chloroplast and other biological systems conducted since the 1960s, including the longstanding well-characterized energetic problems of alkalophilic bacteria such as Bacillus firmus. It can also help reconcile the elegant scientific observations of both the Dilley experiment and the Junge neutral-red thylakoid proton detection. Our analysis indicates that the Mitchellian view of delocalized proton coupling to ATP synthase could only be true under special circumstances; namely, when the membrane electrical potential difference is near zero and the bulk phase-to-bulk phase pH difference becomes the dominant factor. The proton coupling under most physiological conditions of photosynthesis is likely to occur in a mixed state of proton electrostatic localization of excess charge at the membrane surface and delocalization in the bulk media. The proton-electrostatics localization hypothesis leads to a new bioenergetics equation for the proton motive force which may provide a unified framework for understanding the energetics of many biological systems.

Dry Excess Electrons in Room-Temperature Ionic Liquids

In this article, we describe general trends to be expected at short times when an excess electron is generated or injected in different room-temperature ionic liquids (RTILs). Perhaps surprisingly, the excess electron does not localize systematically on the positively charged cations. Rather, the excess charge localization pattern is determined by the cation and anion HOMO/LUMO gaps and, more importantly, by their relative LUMO alignments. As revealed by experiments, the short-time (ps/ns) transient UV spectrum of excess electrons in RTILs is often characterized by two bands, a broad band at low energies (above 1000 nm) and another weaker band at higher energies (around 400 nm). Our calculations show that the dry or presolvated electron spectrum (fs) also has two similar features. The broad band at low energies is due to transitions between electronic states with similar character on ions of the same class but in different locations of the liquid. The lower-intensity band at higher energies is due to transitions in which the electron is promoted to electronic states of different character, in some cases on counterions. Depending on the chemical nature of the RTIL, and especially on the anions, excess electrons can localize on cations or anions. Our findings hint at possible design strategies for controlling electron localization, where electron transfer or transport across species can be facilitated or blocked depending on the alignment of the electronic levels of the individual species.

Polarons and Charge Carrier Solvation on Conjugated Carbon Chains: A Comparative Ab Initio Study

We study accommodation of an excess charge carrier on long even-N polyynic oligomers C(N)H(2) due to displacements of the underlying carbon lattice and polarization of the surrounding solvent in the context of carrier self-localization into a polaronic state. Spatial patterns of bond-length alternation, excess charge and spin densities are compared as derived with Hartree-Fock and two hybrid density functional theory methods (BHandHLYP and B3LYP) in conjunction with the polarizable continuum model. Quite distinct resulting pictures of carrier accommodation are found when contributions from different interactions are analyzed. Solvation robustly acts to promote excess charge localization.