Thermal stability of nanoparticle supported on Al₂O₃ with different morphologies

Al₂O₃ nanocrystals with four various morphologies have been synthesized and used to support Pt nanoparticles and their structural stabilities under high temperature treatment were tested. The results show that Pt supported on a novel coral-like Al₂O₃ sample synthesized by methanol solvothermal method showed the highest thermal stability due to the strongest interaction between Pt and the support. But the Pt nanoparticles diameters of all the samples tend to be bimodal distributed, centered around 1–3 and 10–20 nm, which is mainly because the different content of coordinatively unsaturated pentahedral Al³⁺ sites. (paper)