When it comes to reducing the toxins released by burning gasoline, coal, or other such fuels, the catalyst needs to be reliable. Yet, a promising catalyst, cerium dioxide (CeO 2 ), seemed erratic. The catalyst's three different surfaces behaved differently. For the first time, researchers got an atomically resolved view of the three structures, including the placement of previously difficult-to-visualize oxygen atoms. This information may provide insights into why the surfaces have distinct catalytic properties.

Solving the three different atomic surface structures of CeO 2 nanoparticles provides insight into how to potentially control the morphology of the nanoparticles to improve catalytic selectivity, activity and stability. This knowledge provides an opportunity to potentially improve the catalytic properties of CeO 2 nanoparticles in catalytic converters in vehicles and other applications.

Cerium oxide (CeO 2 ) nanoparticles are widely used in chemical catalysis. Typical CeO 2 catalytic nanoparticles have three main surfaces exposed: (100), (110) and (111). Previous studies show that the differing catalytic properties of each surface are closely related to the atomic structure of the surface. Unfortunately, scientists had difficulties in visualizing the oxygen atoms that pack these surfaces. The challenge was overcome by a team of researchers at Northwestern University, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, and Argonne National Laboratory.

The researchers determined the surface structures using the most advanced chromatic and spherical aberration-corrected electron microscope at Argonne National Laboratory. The microscope enables clear imaging of both cerium and oxygen atoms.

For the high energy (100) surface, the presence of cerium, oxygen, and reduced cerium oxide terminations on the outermost surface as well as the partially occupied lattice sites in the near-surface region (~1 nm from the surface) were directly observed. The disordered surface demonstrates that the previous understanding of the (100) surface was oversimplified.

For the (110) surface, a combination of reduced flat CeO 2-x surface layers and "sawtooth-like" (111) nanofacets exist. The (111) surface is terminated by an oxygen layer, precisely as anticipated from previous models, and consistent with its high stability. Further, the surface structures derived from the microscopy study are consistent with results from a macroscopic infrared spectroscopy investigation.