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Highly accurate ab initio molecular dynamics (MD) methods are the gold standard for studying molecular mechanisms in the condensed phase, however, they are too expensive to capture many key properties that converge slowly with respect to simulation length and time scales. Machine learning (ML) approaches which reach the accuracy of ab initio simulation, and which are, at the same time, sufficiently affordable hold the key to bridging this gap. In this work we present a robust ML potential for the EC:EMC binary solvent, a key component of liquid electrolytes in rechargeable Li-ion batteries. We identify the necessary ingredients needed to successfully model this liquid mixture of organic molecules. In particular, we address the challenge posed by the separation of scale between intra- and inter-molecular interactions, which is a general issue in all condensed phase molecular systems.

Robust correlation curves are essential to decipher structural information from IR-vibrational spectra. However, for surface-adsorbed water and hydroxides, few such correlations have been presented in the literature. In this paper, OH vibrational frequencies are correlated against 12 structural descriptors representing the quantum mechanical or geometrical environment, focusing on those external to the vibrating molecule. A nonbiased fitting procedure based on Gaussian process regression (GPR) was used alongside simple analytical functional forms. The training data consist of 217 structurally unique OH groups from 38 water/metal oxide interface systems for MgO, CaO and CeO2, all optimized at the DFT level, and the fully anharmonic and uncoupled OH vibrational signatures were calculated. Among our results, we find the following: (i) The intermolecular R(H center dot center dot center dot O) hydrogen bond distance is particularly strong, indicating the primary cause of the frequency shift. (ii) Similarly, the electric field along the H-bond vector is also a good descriptor. (iii) Highly detailed machine learning descriptors (ACSF, SOAP) are less intuitive but were found to be more capable descriptors. (iv) Combinations of geometric and QM descriptors give the best predictions, supplying complementary information.

Catalytic properties of the 2D material Nb2CO2 (MXene) with a surface oxygen vacancy and a supported single Pd atom in it (Pd/OV-Nb2CO2) is explored using DFT calculations. It is found that the single Pd atom can be stably anchored in the oxygen vacancy and out of three mechanisms for carbon monoxide oxidation were studied for our model catalyst and one of them shows promising features, namely CO oxidation via a tri-molecular Eley–Rideal (TER) mechanism which has a small activation barrier of 0.42 eV. This result may provide some guidance for the selection of anode materials with high CO-tolerance and high efficiency in removing CO from H2 for PEMFCs.

We study substitutional fluorine, chlorine and bromine impurities at CeO2(111), and their effects on the oxygen chemistry of the surface, using density functional theory. We find that impurity formation results in a halide ion and one Ce3+ ion for all three halogens, although the formation energy depends strongly on the identity of the halogen; however, once formed, all three halogens exhibit a similar propensity to form impurity-impurity pairs. Furthermore, while the effects of halogen impurities on oxygen vacancy formation are marginal, they are more significant for oxygen molecule adsorption, due to electron transfer from the Ce3+ ion which results in an adsorbed superoxide molecule. We also consider the displacement of a halide ion on to the surface by half of an oxygen molecule, and find that the energy required to do so depends strongly not only on the identity of the halogen, but also on whether or not a second halogen impurity, with its associated Ce3+ ion, is present; if it is, then the process is greatly facilitated. Overall, our results demonstrate the existence of a rich variety of ways in which the oxygen chemistry of CeO2(111) may be modified by the presence of halogen dopants.

Density functional theory calculations (DFT), coupled with microkinetic modelling, have been used to simulate Temperature Programmed Desorption (TPD) experiments for calcined ceria nanopowders with the aim to gain insight into the chemistry governing their high redox activity. Our simulations consider two main nanoparticle models. One is a perfect ceria octahedron supercharged with adsorbed oxygen molecules turned into superoxide ions, as has previously been used to explain the enhanced oxygen storage capacity (OSC) in nanoceria. The other model is a variant where we have introduced oxygen vacancies under ridge Ce ions, thereby reducing their coordination numbers to five. The results from our microkinetic modelling suggest that including such five-coordinated Ce adsorption sites results in a TPD spectrum that better matches the experimental counterpart in terms of both peak position and width. In addition, this new structural model allows for the co-existence of Ce 3 + ions, superoxide ions and O2 molecules, as seen in experiments in the literature.

The rational design of ideal catalysts for the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) is of great significance for solving the electrocatalytic potential problems in proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs). Ptn (n = 1–4) and Pt3Au alloy subnanoclusters supported on a defective Ti2CO2 monolayer with oxygen vacancies (denoted as v-Ti2CO2) are simulated by using density functional theory to investigate their ORR performance. The geometries, energetics, and electronic properties of the different systems are analyzed. It is found that the supported Pt3Au alloy subnanocluster possesses the best ORR activity. The underlying mechanisms of the improved ORR activity originates from the moderate hybridization between the O 2p and the 5d orbitals of Au and Pt according to the density of states analysis. Our study suggests a facile route for designing low-cost MXene-based electrocatalysts by alloying transition metals with Pt catalysts, which may stimulate realization of suitable alternative catalysts for ORR catalysis.

Understanding of structural preferences and dynamics of water at the TiO2–H2O interface is fundamentally impor- tant in the perspective of broad range of TiO2 applications that extend from bio-adsorption for medical devices, photo- catalysis for energy production, to coatings with remarkable self-cleaning and anti-fogging properties. However, current knowledge on these systems under full hydration result almost entirely from modelling rather than direct experimental observations. Surface-sensitive techniques like electron microscopy (EM) or X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) operate under high vacuum, therefore do not provide insights into phenomena underlying the real catalytic and bio-adsorption processes that take place under wet conditions. Herein, atomic-level characterization of TiO2 nanoparticles surface under full hydration was performed by a combination of 1H magic-angle spinning (MAS) nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy and molecular dynamics density functional theory (MD-DFT) simulations. Thanks to partial proton to deuteron exchange and fast MAS, resolved NMR signals from OH/H2O species at the TiO2–H2O interface could be observed and interpreted with chemical shifts calculations performed on system evolution trajectory frames. Presence of the recently debated atmospheric carboxylic acids was confirmed, however, the amount of these was small compared to OH/H2O surface species. Surface protonation and evolution of hydrogen-bonded network are shown to govern the surface chemistry of TiO2 under wet conditions.

International audience; This roadmap presents the transformational research ideas proposed by "BATTERY 2030+", the European large-scale research initiative for future battery chemistries. In this paper we outline a "chemistry-neutral" roadmap to advance battery research, particularly at low TRL, with a time horizon of about ten years. The roadmap is centered around six themes: 1) accelerated materials discovery platform, 2) battery interface genome, with the integration of smart functionalities such as 3) sensoring and 4) self-healing processes. Beyond chemistry related aspects we also include crosscutting research regarding 5) manufacturability and 6) recyclability. This roadmap should be seen as an important enabling complement to the many global battery roadmaps which focus on expected ultrahigh battery performance, especially for the future of transports. Batteries are used in many other applications and are considered to be one of Europe's key technologies necessary to reach the climate goals. Currently the market is dominated by lithium-ion batteries, which performs well in most applications, but despite new generations coming in near time, soon will approach their performance limits. Without major breakthroughs, battery performance and production requirements will not be sufficient to enable the building of a climate-neutral society. Through our "chemistry neutral" approach we aim to create a generic toolbox transforming the way we develop and design batteries, which later benefit into the development of specific battery chemistries and technologies. The goal is to integrate modeling and high-through-put experimental results in a closed integrated loop and manage the large amounts of data we generate to learn more about complex processes on different levels affecting the function of a battery cell or a battery system. Based on this we suggest concrete actions with the ambition to be part of and support the implementation of the European Green Deal, the UN Sustainable Development Goals, as well as the European Strategic Action plan on Batteries and the Strategic Energy Technology Plan.

A computational protocol is developed for efficient studies of partially reduced redox-active oxides using the self-consistent charge density functional tight-binding method. The protocol is demonstrated for ceria, which is a prototypical reducible oxide material. The underlying idea is to achieve a consistent (and harmonized) set of Slater–Koster (SK) tables with connected repulsive potentials that enable switching on and off the in-valence description of the Ce 4 f states without serious loss of accuracy in structure and energetics. The implicit treatment of the Ce 4 f states, with the use of f-in-core SK-tables, is found to lead to a significant decrease in computational time. More importantly, it allows for explicit control of the oxidation states of individual Ce atoms. This makes it possible to “freeze” the electronic configuration, thereby allowing the exploration of the energetics for various meta-stable configurations. We anticipate that the outlined strategy can help to shed light on the interplay between the size, shape, and redox activity for nanoceria and other related materials.

The adhesion of amino acids and small organic molecules on TiO2 nanoparticles is fundamental for bio-nano functionalization of peptides and proteins. The adsorption free energy is the main physical quantity that regulates the adsorption process. Its evaluation is particularly challenging both experimentally, due to the weak interfacial signal in aqueous environments, and by atomistic simulations, due to the complexity of the physical phenomena occurring at the solid-water interface (polarization and charge transfer effects). We report here an accurate experimental-computational study of hydrated TiO2 nanoparticles interacting with Glycine where we obtain quantitative agreement of the measured adsorption free energy. Ab-initio simulations are performed within the Tight Binding Density Functional Theory in combination with enhanced free energy sampling techniques. The experiments adopt a new and efficient set-up for electrochemical impedance spectroscopy measurements based on screen-printed gold electrodes. The measured adsorption free energy is about -30 kJ/mol (both from experiment and calculation), with preferential interaction of the charged NH3 group which strongly adsorbs on the TiO2 bridging oxygens. The perfect agreement between computation and experiment opens the doors to an extended exploration of the bio-nano interaction for different materials and molecules.

The CO2 molecule is weakly bound in water. Here we analyze the influence of a dissolved CO2 molecule on the structure and OH vibrational spectra of the surrounding water. From the analysis of ab initio molecular dynamics simulations (BLYP-D3) we present static (structure, coordination, H-bonding, tetrahedrality) and dynamical (OH vibrational spectra) properties of the water molecules as a function of distance from the solute. We find a weakly oscillatory variation (“ABBA”) in the ‘solution minus bulk water’ spectrum. The origin of these features can largely be traced back to solvent–solute hard-core interactions which lead to variations in density and tetrahedrality when moving from the solute’s vicinity out to the bulk region. The high-frequency peak in the solute-affected spectra is specifically analyzed and found to originate from both water OH groups that fulfill the geometric H-bond criteria, and from those that do not (dangling ones). Effectively, neither is hydrogen-bonded.

Corrosion occurring in reinforced concrete has turned into a primary concern of the current century, concrete being the most ubiquitous and predominant material used in the construction industry. Among the many interrelated processes that trigger corrosion of metallic reinforcements, the penetration of chloride ions into the concrete matrix is the most insidious threat. Herein, we developed the first electrochemical device entirely made of paper that allows for the direct, prompt, and noninvasive evaluation of free chloride ion contamination in concrete-based constructions. Our device is based on a three-layer wax-modified filter paper, consisting of two Ag/AgCl screen-printed electrodes that are interfaced by a junction pad in a sandwich-like configuration. Filter paper allows for generating a vertical-flow potentiometric device capable of measuring the electrochemical potential between two solutions containing different concentrations of chloride ions, which are separately drop-cast on the top and bottom layers. After demonstrating the analytical performance of the device, the same principle was applied to the evaluation of the chloride contents in different concrete samples, exploiting paper as a suitable interfacing material for potentiometric measurements on the cement solid surface. Laboratory-prepared concrete samples with known chloride contents were first assessed, and then, the paper-based vertical-flow device was applied to real concrete structures at the Giacomo Manzù Museum (Ardea, Italy) for the evaluation of chloride contamination caused by the proximity to the seaside. The capability of our device to provide timely warning of the risk conditions of concrete-based artifacts was demonstrated.

We study substitutional fluorine, chlorine and bromine impurities at CeO

We report an ab initio molecular dynamics (MD) simulation investigating the effect of a fully hydrated surface of TiO2 on the water dynamics. It is found that the universal relation between the rotational and translational diffusion characteristics of bulk water is broken in the water layers near the surface with the rotational diffusion demonstrating progressive retardation relative to the translational diffusion when approaching the surface. This kind of rotation-translation decoupling has so far only been observed in the supercooled liquids approaching glass transition, and its observation in water at a normal liquid temperature is of conceptual interest. This finding is also of interest for the application-significant studies of the water interaction with fully hydrated nanoparticles. We note that this is the first observation of rotation-translation decoupling in an ab initio MD simulation of water.

BATTERY 2030+ targets the development of a chemistry neutral platform for accelerating the development of new sustainable high-performance batteries. Here, a description is given of how the AI-assisted toolkits and methodologies developed in BATTERY 2030+ can be transferred and applied to representative examples of future battery chemistries, materials, and concepts. This perspective highlights some of the main scientific and technological challenges facing emerging low-technology readiness level (TRL) battery chemistries and concepts, and specifically how the AI-assisted toolkit developed within BIG-MAP and other BATTERY 2030+ projects can be applied to resolve these. The methodological perspectives and challenges in areas like predictive long time- and length-scale simulations of multi-species systems, dynamic processes at battery interfaces, deep learned multi-scaling and explainable AI, as well as AI-assisted materials characterization, self-driving labs, closed-loop optimization, and AI for advanced sensing and self-healing are introduced. A description is given of tools and modules can be transferred to be applied to a select set of emerging low-TRL battery chemistries and concepts covering multivalent anodes, metal-sulfur/oxygen systems, non-crystalline, nano-structured and disordered systems, organic battery materials, and bulk vs. interface-limited batteries., The authors acknowledge the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under grant agreements no. 957189 (BIG-MAP) and no. 957213 (BATTERY 2030+). K.H. acknowledges the Swedish Research Council (Vetenskapsrådet) and the Swedish national Strategic e-Science programme eSSENCE. R.D. acknowledges the financial support from the Slovenian Research Agency (research core funding P2-0393 and Project N2-0214). H.S.S. acknowledges funding from Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) under Germany's Excellence Strategy—EXC 2154—Project number 390874152. M.C.-C. acknowledges the Spanish Ministerio de Ciencia, Innovación y Universidades (Project reference number: PID2019-107106RB-C33). M.R.P. acknowledges the Spanish Agencia Estatal de Investigación Severo Ochoa Programme for Centres of Excellence in R&D (CEX2019-000917-S)., With funding from the Spanish government through the ‘Severo Ochoa Centre of Excellence’ accreditation (CEX2019-000917-S).

Water on metal oxides interfaces generate a variety of ordered motifs that depend on the structural properties of the exposed solid surfaces. Here we emphasize the importance of considering the thermodynamic state of the surrounding liquid to find the interface structures in real systems. In particular, using ab initio molecular dynamics, we have studied the thermodynamic behavior of the water induced reconstructed (WIR) anatase (0 0 1) surface under full hydration. The long standing issue of the reconstruction symmetry in this facet of the anatase, that is the TiO2 stable phase at the nanoscale, is addressed showing that the stable state for a WIR surface in vacuum and in bulk water are different, the latter depending on the thermodynamic state of the system. Thermally activated surface phase transitions between (2×4) and (2×3) symmetries are lead by the surface relaxation caused by the molecular adsorption and release phenomena at the interface. Our approach enables the validation to aqueous environment of surface-confined water structures derived in vacuum, emphasizing the role of the thermodynamics conditions for characterizing solid-liquid interfaces especially for nano sized systems.

Open access to research data is increasingly important for accelerating research. Grant authorities therefore request detailed plans for how data is managed in the projects they finance. We have recently developed such a plan for the EU-H2020 BIG-MAP project - a cross-disciplinary project targeting disruptive battery-material discoveries. Essential for reaching the goal is extensive sharing of research data across scales, disciplines and stakeholders, not limited to BIG-MAP and the European BATTERY 2030+ initiative but within the entire battery community. The key challenges faced in developing the data management plan for such a large and complex project were to generate an overview of the enormous amount of data that will be produced, to build an understanding of the data flow within the project and to agree on a roadmap for making all data FAIR. This paper describes the process we followed and how we structured the plan., 12 pages, 4 figures; the full DMP is published as Supporting Information

Batteries and supercapacitors are electrochemical energy storage systems which involve multiple time-scales and length-scales. In terms of the electrolyte which serves as the ionic conductor, a molecular-level understanding of the corresponding transport phenomena, electrochemical (thermal) stability and interfacial properties is crucial for optimizing the device performance and achieving safety requirements. To this end, atomistic machine learning is a promising technology for bridging microscopic models and macroscopic phenomena. Here, we provide a timely snapshot of recent advances in this area. This includes technical considerations that are particularly relevant for modelling electrolytes as well as specific examples of both bulk electrolytes and associated interfaces. A perspective on methodological challenges and new applications is also discussed.

The rational design of ideal catalysts for the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) is of great significance for solving the electrocatalytic potential problems in proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs). Pt

Alkaline electrolyte solutions are important components in rechargeable batteries and alkaline fuel cells. As the ionic conductivity is thought to be a limiting factor in the performance of these devices, which are often operated at elevated temperatures, its temperature dependence is of significant interest. Here we use NaOH as a prototypical example of alkaline electrolytes, and for this system we have carried out reactive molecular dynamics simulations with an experimentally verified high-dimensional neural network potential derived from density-functional theory calculations. It is found that in concentrated NaOH solutions elevated temperatures enhance both the contributions from proton transfer to the ionic conductivity and deviations from the Nernst-Einstein relation. These findings are expected to be of practical relevance for electrochemical devices based on alkaline electrolyte solutions.

It has been suggested in the literature that keto‐to‐enol tautomerization plays a vital role for lignin fragmentation under mild conditions. On the other hand, previous modelling has shown that the adsorbed keto form is more stable than enol on the Pd(111) catalyst. The current density functional theory study of lignin model molecules shows that, in the gas‐phase, keto is more stable than enol, but on the Pd surface, we find enol conformers that are at least as stable as keto. This supports the experimental result that the favourable reaction pathway for lignin depolymerization involves keto‐enol tautomerization. An energy decomposition analysis gives insights concerning the origin of the fine energy balance between the keto and enol forms, where the molecule–surface interaction (−7 eV) and the molecular strain energy (+3 eV) are the main contributors to the adsorption energy., It's a fine balance: Experiments have suggested that keto‐enol tautomerism constitutes one important step in lignin's depolymerization reaction under mild conditions. In the gas‐phase, the keto form is more stable than the enol form, but the presented DFT study shows that, on the surface of a Pd catalyst, the enol conformers can be at least as stable as the keto conformers, supporting experiments.

Thin film structures of water on the CeO2(111) surface for coverages between 0.5 and 2.0 water monolayers have been optimized and analyzed using density functional theory (optPBE-vdW functional). We present a new 1.0 ML structure that is both the lowest in energy published and features a hydrogen-bond network extending the surface in one-dimension, contrary to what has been found in the literature, and contrary to what has been expected due to the large bulk ceria cell dimension. The adsorption energies for the monolayer and multilayered water structures agree well with experimental temperature programmed desorption results from the literature, and we discuss the stability window of CeO2(111) surfaces covered with 0.5-2.0 ML of water.

Herein, we present the first paper-based device for facing one of the worldwide concerns of the Modern age: the corrosion-induced deterioration of reinforced concrete. Indeed, the monitoring of cor ...

The effect of biaxial strain on the band structure of two-dimensional silicon nanosheets (Si NSs) with (111), (110), and (001) exposed surfaces was investigated by means of density functional theory calculations. For all the considered Si NSs, an indirect-to-direct band gap transition occurs as the lateral dimensions of Si NSs increase; that is, increasing lateral biaxial strain from compressive to tensile always enhances the direct band gap characteristics. Further analysis revealed the mechanism of the transition which is caused by preferential shifts of the conduction band edge at a specific k-point because of their bond characteristics. Our results explain a photoluminescence result of the (111) Si NSs [U. Kim et al., ACS Nano 2011, 5, 2176–2181] in terms of the plausible tensile strain imposed in the unoxidized inner layer by surface oxidation.

The significant cooperative effect between water molecules substantially affects the properties of liquid water. The cooperativity of hydrogen bonds means that the hydrogen bond strength is influenced by the neighboring water molecules. Another descriptor related to cooperativity is degree correlation (or static correlation) describing the probability of hydrogen-bonded molecule pairs participating in additional hydrogen-bonds. Herein we analyze the latter one in liquid water at various temperatures and densities in a series of molecular dynamics simulations with the help of knowledge from network science. We investigated how the applied hydrogen bond criteria (energetic or geometric) influence the obtained results, and showed that the energetic criterion is much more rigorous and reliable, therefore should be used for similar studies. We found that the structure of the subsystems of water molecules with 3 and 4 hydrogen-bonds is distinctly different at low temperature, 3‑hydrogen-bonded water molecules form branched chain structures at all temperature. Deconvolution of the descriptors of the mixing pattern of water molecules according to their donor and acceptor numbers showed that species with complementary hydrogen bonding properties are likely to correlate and form H-bonds with each other, while species with similar H-bond pattern tend to avoid each other. Pearson's coefficient (global descriptor of the local cooperativity) of the studied networks suggests that at normal density the H-bonded network in liquid water can be described by an uncorrelated network.

The hydration-shell of CO2 is characterized using Raman multivariate curve resolution (Raman-MCR) spectroscopy combined with ab initio molecular dynamics (AIMD) vibrational density of states simulations, to validate our assignment of the experimentally observed high-frequency OH band to a weak hydrogen bond between water and CO2. Our results reveal that while the hydration-shell of CO2 is highly tetrahedral, it is also occasionally disrupted by the presence of entropically stabilized defects associated with the CO2-water hydrogen bond. Moreover, we find that the hydration-shell of CO2 undergoes a temperature-dependent structural transformation to a highly disordered (less tetrahedral) structure, reminiscent of the transformation that takes place at higher temperatures around much larger oily molecules. The biological significance of the CO2 hydration shell structural transformation is suggested by the fact that it takes place near physiological temperatures.

The interplay between energetics and entropy in determining defect distributions at ceria(111) is studied using a combination of DFT+U and lattice Monte Carlo simulations. Our main example is fluorine impurities, although we also present preliminary results for surface hydroxyl groups. A simple classical force-field model was constructed from a training set of DFT+U data for all symmetrically inequivalent (F−)n(Ce3+)n nearest-neighbor clusters with n = 2 or 3. Our fitted model reproduces the DFT energies well. We find that for an impurity concentration of 15% at 600 K, straight and hooked linear fluorine clusters are surprisingly abundant, with similarities to experimental STM images from the literature. We also find that with increasing temperature the fluorine cluster sizes show a transition from being governed by an attractive potential to being governed by a repulsive potential as a consequence of the increasing importance of the entropy of the Ce3+ ions. The distributions of surface hydroxyl groups are noticeably different.

The aim of the European Materials Modelling Council (EMMC) is to establish current and forward looking complementary activities necessary to bring the field of materials modelling closer to the demands of manufacturers (both small and large enterprises) in Europe. The ultimate goal is that materials modelling and simulation will become an integral part of product life cycle management in European industry, thereby making a strong contribution to enhance innovation and competitiveness on a global level. Based on intensive efforts in the past two years within the EMMC, which included numerous consultation and networking actions with representatives of all stakeholders including Modellers, Software Owners, Translators and Manufacturers in Europe, the EMMC identified and proposed a set of underpinning and enabling actions to increase the industrial exploitation of materials modelling in Europe. EMMC will pursue the following overarching objectives in order to bridge the gap between academic innovation and industrial application: • enhance the interaction and collaboration between all stakeholders engaged in different types of materials modelling, including modellers, software owners, translators and manufacturers, • facilitate integrated materials modelling in Europe building on strong and coherent foundations, • coordinate and support actors and mechanisms that enable rapid transfer of materials modelling from academic innovation to the end users and potential beneficiaries in industry, • achieve greater awareness and uptake of materials modelling in industry, in particular SMEs, • elaborate Roadmaps that (i) identify major obstacles to widening the use of materials modelling and (ii) elaborate strategies to overcome them.

On the basis of first-principles calculations, Fe, Co, Ni, Cu, Zn, Ru, Rh, Ag, Ir, Pt, and Au decorated Mo2CO2-delta monolayers are investigated as potential single-atom catalyst (SAC) candidates f ...

Herein, we report the first electrochemical sensor based on a screen-printed electrode designed to evaluate the corrosion level in iron-reinforced concrete specimens. The combination of an Ag pseudoreference electrode with a gel polymeric electrolyte allows for fast, stable and cost-effective potentiometric measurements, suitable for evaluating the corrosion of iron bars embedded in concrete samples. The sensor was found to be capable of discriminating between a standard non-corroded sample and samples subject to corrosion due to the presence of chloride or carbonate in the concrete matrix. The potential in concrete-based specimens containing carbonate (pH 9, −0.35 ± 0.03 V) or chloride (4% w/w, −0.52 ± 0.01 V) was found to be more negative than in a standard concrete-based sample (−0.251 ± 0.003 V), in agreement with the ASTM standard C876 method which uses a classical Cu/CuSO4 solid reference electrode. Our results demonstrate that a printed Ag pseudoreference electrode combined with KCl agar provides an efficient and reliable electrochemical system for evaluating the corrosion of iron bars embedded in concrete-based structures. Keywords: Screen-printed reference electrode, Agar gel, Potentiometric measurement, Iron bar corrosion

Combining experimental spectroscopy and hybrid density functional theory calculations, we show that the incorporation of fluoride ions into a prototypical reducible oxide surface, namely, ceria(111), can induce a variety of nontrivial changes to the local electronic structure, beyond the expected increase in the number of Ce3+ ions. Our resonant photoemission spectroscopy results reveal new states above, within, and below the valence band, which are unique to the presence of fluoride ions at the surface. With the help of hybrid density functional calculations, we show that the different states arise from fluoride ions in different atomic layers in the near surface region. In particular, we identify a structure in which a fluoride ion substitutes for an oxygen ion at the surface, with a second fluoride ion on top of a surface Ce4+ ion giving rise to F 2p states which overlap the top of the O 2p band. The nature of this adsorbate F−–Ce4+ resonant enhancement feature suggests that this bond is at least partially covalent. Our results demonstrate the versatility of anion doping as a potential means of tuning the valence band electronic structure of ceria.

Density functional theory (DFT) calculations, combined with a constrained minima hopping algorithm (global minimum search while preserving the molecular identity), have been performed to investigate important reaction intermediates for the heterogeneously catalyzed β-O-4′ bond cleavage in lignin derivatives. More specifically, we have studied the adsorption properties of a keto tautomer (1-methoxypropan-2-one) and its enol form on a catalytically active Pd(111) surface. In agreement with experiments, we find that for the gas-phase molecules the keto tautomer is the most stable. Interestingly, the enol tautomer has a higher affinity to the Pd catalyst than the keto form, and becomes the most stable molecular form when adsorbed on the catalyst surface. The global minimum complex found on the metal surface corresponds to an enolate structure formed when the enol tautomer chemisorbs onto the surface and donates its π-electrons from the C═C region to two adjacent palladium atoms. The actual formation of a chem...

We investigate how the redox properties of ceria are affected by the fraction of Fock exchange in screened HSE06-based hybrid density functionals, and we compare with $\mathrm{PBE}+U$ results, and with experiments when available. We find that using $\ensuremath{\sim}15%$ Fock exchange yields a good compromise with respect to structure, electronic structure, and calculated reduction energies, and represents a significant improvement over the $\mathrm{PBE}+U$ results. We also investigate the possibility to use a computationally cheaper HSE06//$\mathrm{PBE}+U$ protocol consisting of structure optimization with $\mathrm{PBE}+U$, a subsequent lattice parameter rescaling step, and, finally, a single-point full hybrid calculation. We find that such a composite computational protocol works very well and yields results in close agreement with those where HSE06 was used also for the structure optimization.

The widespread use of ceria-based materials and the need to design suitable strategies to prepare eco-friendly CeO2 supports for effective catalytic screening induced us to extend our computational multiscale protocol to the modeling of the hybrid organic/oxide interface between prototypical fluorinated linear alkane chains (polyethylene-like oligomers) and low-index ceria surfaces. The combination of quantum chemistry calculations and classical reactive molecular dynamics simulations provides a comprehensive picture of the interface and discloses, at the atomic level, the main causes of typical adsorption modes. The data show that at room temperature a moderate percentage of fluorine atoms (around 25%) can enhance the interaction of the organic chains by anchoring strongly pivotal fluorines to the channels of the underneath ceria (100) surface, whereas an excessive content can remarkably reduce this interaction because of the repulsion between fluorine and the negatively charged oxygen of the surface.

We propose that crystalline ionic hydrates constitute a valuable resource for benchmarking theoretical methods for aqueous ionic systems. Many such structures are known from the experimental literature, and they contain a large variety of water–water and ion–water structural motifs. Here we have collected a data set (CRYSTALWATER50) of 50 structurally unique “in-crystal” water molecules, involved in close to 100 nonequivalent O–H···O hydrogen bonds. A dozen well-known DFT functionals were benchmarked with respect to their ability to describe these experimental structures and their OH vibrational frequencies. We find that the PBE, RPBE-D3, and optPBE-vdW methods give the best H-bond distances and that anharmonic OH frequencies generated from B3LYP//optPBE-vdW energy scans outperform the other methods, i.e., here we performed B3LYP energy scans along the OH stretching coordinate while the rest of the structure was kept fixed at the optPBE-vdW-optimized positions.

We analyse the OH vibrational signatures of 56 structurally unique water molecules and 34 structurally unique hydroxide ions in thin water films on MgO(001) and CaO(001), using DFT-generated anharmonic potential energy surfaces. We find that the OH stretching frequencies of intact water molecules on the surface are always downshifted with respect to the gas-phase species while the OH- groups are either upshifted or downshifted. Despite these differences, the main characteristics of the frequency shifts for all three types of surface OH groups (OHw, OsH and OHf) can be accounted for by one unified expression involving the in situ electric field from the surrounding environment, and the gas-phase molecular properties of the vibrating species (H2O or OH-). The origin behind the different red- and blueshift behaviour can be traced back to the fact that the molecular dipole moment of a gas-phase water molecule increases when an OH bond is stretched, but the opposite is true for the hydroxide ion. We propose that familiarity with the relations presented here will help surface scientists in the interpretation of vibrational OH spectra for thin water films on ionic crystal surfaces.

This paper concerns thin water films and their hydrogen-bond patterns on ionic surfaces. As far as we are aware, this is the first time H-bond correlations for surface water and hydroxide species are presented in the literature while hydrogen-bond relations in the solid state have been scrutinized for at least five decades. Our data set, which was derived using density functional theory, consists of 116 unique surface OH groups–intact water molecules as well as hydroxides–on MgO(001), CaO(001) and NaCl(001), covering the whole range from strong to weak to no H-bonds. The intact surface water molecules are found to always be redshifted with respect to the gas-phase water OH vibrational frequency, whereas the surface hydroxide groups are either redshifted (OsH) or blueshifted (OHf) compared to the gas-phase OH– frequency. The surface H-bond relations are compared with the traditional relations for bulk crystals. We find that the “ν(OH) vs R(H···O)” correlation curve for surface water does not coincide with ...

We have developed a reactive force-field of the ReaxFF type for stoichiometric ceria (CeO2) and partially reduced ceria (CeO2–x). We describe the parametrization procedure and provide results validating the parameters in terms of their ability to accurately describe the oxygen chemistry of the bulk, extended surfaces, surface steps, and nanoparticles of the material. By comparison with our reference electronic structure method (PBE+U), we find that the stoichiometric bulk and surface systems are well reproduced in terms of bulk modulus, lattice parameters, and surface energies. For the surfaces, step energies on the (111) surface are also well described. Upon reduction, the force-field is able to capture the bulk and surface vacancy formation energies (Evac), and in particular, it reproduces the Evac variation with depth from the (110) and (111) surfaces. The force-field is also able to capture the energy hierarchy of differently shaped stoichiometric nanoparticles (tetrahedra, octahedra, and cubes), and ...

We explore a method that cart sirriulate infrared refiection absotption spectroscopy (IRRAS) spectra for molecules adsjorlied on semiconductor surfaces. The method rakes it possible to directly cor ...

The interaction between water molecules and small Cu clusters (up to a size of four atoms) adsorbed on the nonpolar ZnO(10 (1) over bar0) surface has been studied using hybrid density functional th ...