Artículos SCI

The present work showcases the versatility of nanogold systems supported on Zn-doped ceria when applied in two important environmental processes, the total CO oxidation, and the liquid phase oxidation of glucose to gluconic acid. In the CO oxidation the suitability of these materials is clearly demonstrated achieving full conversions even at sub-ambient conditions. Regarding the glucose oxidation our materials display high conversion values (always over 50%) and very importantly full or almost full selectivity toward gluconic acid-an added value platform chemical in the context of biomass upgrading routes. The key factors controlling the successful performance on both reactions are carefully discussed and compared to previous studies in literature. To our knowledge this is one of the very few works in catalysis by gold combining liquid and gas phase reactions and represents a step forward in the flexible behavior of nano gold catalysts.

This work is concentrated on getting a reply to the following question: how does the grain size of boron carbide specimens influence on their mechanical and electrical response? It is a common issue that both essential properties are usually affected by the grain boundaries. To this purpose, a set of near fully-dense boron carbide specimens were prepared by spark plasma sintering. In order to reduce residual porosity and grain-size effects, nanoindentation tests at room temperature were conducted. DC conductivity was measured through four-point test technique from room temperature up to 800 °C. The results show that hardness can reach values as high as ∼60 GPa and plasticity onset takes place at around 23 GPa by dislocation nucleation. Regarding the conductivity, it is found that grain boundaries can block the mobility of bipolarons in an effective way. A simple additive law is provided to account for the resistivity of boron carbide polycrystals.