Chance and necessity: my encounter with gold catalysts

Abstract

"Have you tried gold?" This question after a presentation on hydrogen oxidation steered Masatake Haruta's research on heterogeneous catalysis. He found that gold combined with 3d transition metal oxides could exhibit surprisingly high catalytic activity for carbon monoxide oxidation at temperatures as low as 203 K.

Keywords: gold catalysis; heterogeneous catalysis; nanoparticles.