A spectroscopic study of the adsorption and reactions of methanol,formaldehyde and methyl formate on clean and oxygenated Cu(110) surfaces

The adsorption and reaction of methanoi (CH₃OH), methyl formate (CH₃OCHO) and formaldehyde (H₂CO) on clean and oxygen-covered Cu(110) surfaces has been studied with EELS, UPS and thermal desorption spectroscopy (TDS). The clean surface is relatively unreactive but adsorbed oxygen readily attacks the hydroxyl proton and formyl carbon atoms to generate the intermediate methoxy (CH₃O) and formate (HCOO). Methyl formate is split into two intermediates, methoxy and formate. By correlating the three techniques we analyse (a) the condensed multilayer at 90 K; (b) the weakly bound molecular monolayer states prior to dissociation or reaction and (c) the reactive intermediates at higher temperatures. Formaldehyde forms the surface polymer polyoxymethylene (CH₂O)_n] in the monolayer on Cu(110) which subsequently reacts with oxygen to generate formate. No molecular formaldehyde was observed above 120 K. Correlation of the EELS and UPS results for polyoxymethylene shows that an earlier interpretation by Rubloff et al. Phys. Rev. B14 (1976) 1450] of anomalous shifts in the formaldehyde UPS spectrum on surfaces is incorrect, and due simply to the new polymeric structure of surface formaldehyde. Methyl formate coordinates to copper via the carbonyl lone pair orbital and methanol via the oxygen lone pair orbital. No evidence was found for methyl formate synthesis by dimerization of formaldehyde (the Tischenko reaction) or dehydrogenation of methanol on the clean Cu(110) surface. These latter reactions are facile over copper catalysts at atmospheric pressure. The success of the oxidation experiments and the failure of the synthesis reactions in UHV is a consequence of the pressure dependence of the equilibrium constants for the different reactions. As found previously in Fischer-Tropsch studies, condensation reaction equilibria are pressure dependent and product formation is considerably suppressed at UHV pressures.