The Mechanism of Potassium Promoter: Enhancing the Stability of Active Surfaces

How do your crystallites grow? DFT calculations and experiments show that potassium promoter (K2O) modifies the crystallographic orientation in catalysts in favor of the formation of Fe crystallites with abundant highly active facets (see picture). This finding opens a new perspective for understanding the promotion effect and for designing efficient catalysts with controllable surface structures. Detailed facts of importance to specialist readers are published as "Supporting Information". Such documents are peer-reviewed, but not copy-edited or typeset. They are made available as submitted by the authors. Please note: The publisher is not responsible for the content or functionality of any supporting information supplied by the authors. Any queries (other than missing content) should be directed to the corresponding author for the article.