Inverse CeO2/CuO catalysts prepared from heterobimetallic metal–organic framework precursor for preferential CO oxidation in H2-rich stream

•Inverse CeO2/CuO catalysts for the preferential CO oxidation in H2-rich steam.•An alternative synthetic approach using MOFs as a precursor for the inverse catalysts.•The structural merits of MOFs are beneficial to the dispersion of active sites of CeO2/CuO.•These catalysts exhibited excellent catalytic activity and selectivity for CO-PROX.

Using heterobimetallic metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) as the precursor, a series of inverse CeO2/CuO catalysts, by which cerial nanoparticles were patched on a copper oxide support, were synthesized. These catalysts exhibited excellent catalytic activity and selectivity during preferential CO oxidation in the H2-rich stream. This new approach based on MOFs precursor has two advantages for optimizing the inverse CeO2/CuO catalysts with more copper-ceria interfacial sites: 1) the highly ordered metal-oxygen clusters were completely separated by the organic linkers; and 2) the Ce/Cu configuration can be modulated. We further found that the calcination temperature and heating rate of MOFs are critical for their catalytic activity.

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