The experimental elucidation of the structures at the interface between a working catalyst and the reacting molecules is the key to a fundamental understanding of heterogeneous catalysis. Researchers from the Department of Inorganic Chemistry have reassigned the vibrational spectrum of vanadium pentoxide, an important catalyst for the synthesis of valuable products through the reaction of organic molecules with gas-phase oxygen, and have thus been able to elucidate which centres are involved in the activation of the oxygen molecule and the oxidation of hydrocarbons.
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