Catalytic Properties of Cerium Oxide Nanostructures

Cerium oxide nanostructures exhibit remarkable catalytic behaviour driven by their ability to undergo rapid and reversible redox transformations between Ce4+ and Ce3+ oxidation states. At the nanoscale, variations in shape, size and exposed crystal facets modulate the density and mobility of oxygen vacancies, which serve as active sites for oxidation and reduction reactions. Nanocubes, nanorods and polyhedral particles each display distinct oxygen storage capacities and reducibility, influencing processes such as CO oxidation, three-way catalysis and thermochemical water splitting. Doping with aliovalent cations further tailors vacancy formation energies, while intimate contact with noble metals enhances oxygen exchange via metal–support interactions. These combined effects underpin global applications in automotive exhaust control, fuel-cell electrodes, pollutant abatement and sustainable hydrogen production.

Research from Nature Portfolio

A foundational study established a perfectly stoichiometric and atomically flat CeO₂(111) surface on a bulk-like ceria film, yielding terraces hundreds of nanometres wide and a well-defined redox interface. This robust platform eliminates substrate artefacts and reveals that the underlying bulk ceria exerts a profound influence on surface vacancy formation and reducibility. By providing a reproducible model of ceria’s surface chemistry, this work has clarified fundamental mechanisms of oxygen exchange and paved the way for quantitative comparisons across disparate catalytic systems.

Catalytic Properties of Cerium Oxide Nanostructures publication trend

The graph below shows the total number of articles in catalytic properties of cerium oxide nanostructures across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).

Technical terms

Oxygen storage capacity (OSC): The ability of ceria to reversibly uptake and release oxygen, linked to Ce4+/Ce3+ redox cycling.

Oxygen vacancy: A missing oxygen ion in the ceria lattice that serves as an active site for redox reactions.

Atomic layer deposition (ALD): A vapour-phase technique for depositing uniform thin films one molecular layer at a time.

X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS): A surface-sensitive method for determining elemental composition and oxidation states via core-level binding energies.

Metal–support interaction: The electronic or structural interplay between metal nanoparticles and the ceria substrate that modifies catalytic performance.

References

1. A perfectly stoichiometric and flat CeO2(111) surface on a bulk-like ceria film. Scientific Reports (2016).
2. In Situ X‐Ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy Study of Atomic Layer Deposited Cerium Oxide on SiO2: Substrate Influence on the Reaction Mechanism During the Early Stages of Growth. Advanced Materials Interfaces (2024).
3. Can oxygen vacancies in ceria surfaces be measured by O1s photoemission spectroscopy?. Journal of Physics Condensed Matter (2022).
4. Dynamics of the Interaction Between Ceria and Platinum During Redox Processes. Frontiers in Chemistry (2019).