Defect engineering in cubic cerium oxide nanostructures for catalytic oxidation

In this manuscript, we identify a nanosize effect in nanostructured cerium oxides. Through leveraging the smaller oxygen storage capacity in nanostructured cerium oxides and the valence fluctuation character of cerium, we demonstrate a synthetic strategy to modulate the density of oxygen vacancy defects (OVD) in these cerium oxides through a novel low pressure thermal activation process. The presence of these defects in the nanostructured cerium oxides was carefully analyzed using high resolution transmission electron microscopy, extended x-ray absorption fine structure spectroscopy, Raman spectroscopy and computational modeling. We believe that our findings lead to an improved understanding of the creation of OVDs in cerium oxide at the nanoscale and their significance in increasing the oxidative catalytic activity of cerium oxide.