Artículos SCI

The use of austenitic stainless steel (AISI 304) as metallic substrate for monolithic catalytic devices is explored in this work as well as an alternative procedure to the washcoating of Al2O3 and CeO2 supported Au catalysts. Thermal treatment of the metallic surface ensured a good adherence of the catalysts. Some preparation parameters, like the number of dipping and drying steps, were controlled in order to obtain an homogeneous and adherent layer of catalyst. The resulting surfaces were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), N-2 Sorption and scanning electron microscopy (SEM), and were tested in the CO oxidation reaction. The highest conversion to CO2 was obtained with the monolith coated with 1% Au-CeO2 in the presence of water.

Herein we establish a clear relation between the parameters that govern the growth dynamics and the structural quality of colloidal crystal films. We report an optical analysis of the spatial distribution of intrinsic defects in colloidal crystal films and correlate our results with a theoretical model describing the growth dynamics of such lattices. We find that the amount of defects fluctuates periodically and decreases along the growth direction of the lattice. We demonstrate that these spatial variations are a direct consequence of the temporal oscillations of the crystal film formation velocity, which are inherent to the colloidal particle deposition process.