All that glitters is not Au~0

摘要

Catalysts containing supported gold nanoparticles are very active in a wide variety of chemical reactions. However, the fundamental principles that govern the activity of supported gold remain unknown. On page 935 of this issue, Fu et al. show that gold cations on a ceriabased support catalyze the commercially important water-gas shift reaction in which carbon monoxide (CO) reacts with water to produce carbon dioxide and hydrogen. Metallic nanoparticles, which are often present on gold catalysts, appear to be spectators that do not participate in the reaction.