Indication of a size-dependent transition from molecular to dissociative chemisorption on clusters

Abstract

We report experimental indications for a size-dependent change of the chemical nature of chemisorption on small atomic clusters. We studied chemisorption of atomic hydrogen on negatively charged Tin- clusters using mass and photoelectron spectroscopy. Our experimental data support the assumption that for clusters with up to four Ti atoms, adsorption of intact H2 molecules is the energetically preferred configuration. For larger Tin clusters with n>4, dissociative hydrogen chemisorption is the most stable configuration, forming clusters with an electronic structure similar to bulk TiH2.