Abstract
Revealing the structure of supported metal oxide catalysts is a prerequisite for establishing the structure - catalysis relationship. Among a variety of characterization techniques, multi-wavelength Raman spectroscopy, combining resonance Raman and non-resonance Raman with different excitation wavelengths, has recently emerged as a particularly powerful tool in not only identifying but also quantifying the structure of supported metal oxide clusters. In this review, we make use of two supported vanadia systems, VOx/SiO2 and VOx/CeO2, as examples to showcase how one can employ this technique to investigate the heterogeneous structure of active oxide clusters and to understand the complex interaction between the oxide clusters and the support. The qualitative and quantitative structural information gained from the multi-wavelength Raman spectroscopy can be utilized to provide fundamental insights for designing more efficient supported metal oxide catalysts.
