Highly dispersed, supported oxides are ubiquitous solid catalysts but can be challenging to characterize with atomic precision. Here, it is shown that crystalline anatase TiO2 nanosheets (∼5 nm thick) are ideal supports for imaging highly dispersed active sites. Ta cations were deposited by several routes, and high-resolution high angle annular dark-field scanning transmission electron microscopy was used to determine the location of Ta with respect to the TiO2 lattice and quantify Ta-Ta distances. In the best case, it is shown that >80% of Ta atoms are isolated from one another, whereas other techniques are blind to this critical catalytic property or give only qualitative estimates. TiO2 nanosheets may prove to be a useful platform for other types of catalysis studies.
Keywords: HAADF STEM; microscopy; oxides; single atom catalysts; supported catalysts.