Increased dispersion of supported gold during methanol carbonylation conditions

Alexandre Goguet; Christopher Hardacre; Ian Harvey; Katabathini Narasimharao; Youssef Saih; Jacinto Sa

doi:10.1021/ja9021705

Increased dispersion of supported gold during methanol carbonylation conditions

J Am Chem Soc. 2009 May 27;131(20):6973-5. doi: 10.1021/ja9021705.

Authors

Alexandre Goguet¹, Christopher Hardacre, Ian Harvey, Katabathini Narasimharao, Youssef Saih, Jacinto Sa

Affiliation

¹ CenTACat, School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Queen's University, Belfast, BT9 5AG, UK.

PMID: 19405467
DOI: 10.1021/ja9021705

Abstract

The active site in supported gold catalysts for the carbonylation of methanol has been identified as dimers/trimers of gold which are formed from large gold particles >10 nm in diameter. Methyl iodide was found to be critical for this dispersion process and to maintain the catalyst in the active form. This study also shows that it may be possible to redisperse gold catalysts, in general, after reaction.