Sword-like CuO/CeO2 composites derived from a Ce-BTC metal–organic framework with superior CO oxidation performance

Abstract

Porous shape-controllable metal oxide composites derived from a metal–organic framework have gained more and more attention due to their extensive applications. In this paper, sword-like CuO/CeO₂ composites were successfully synthesized by calcination of a strawsheave-like Ce-based metal–organic framework (Ce-BTC) containing suitable Cu loading as self-sacrificial templates at 500 °C. Moreover, sword-like CuO/CeO₂ composites displayed superior catalytic performance for CO oxidation, which was ascribed to a good interfacial contact, easily reducible surface copper species at low temperature and abundant surface lattice oxygen species, more Cu⁺ and oxygen vacancies.