Revealing the Adsorption and Decomposition of EP-PTCDI on a Cerium Oxide Surface

Cerium oxide has constantly attracted intense attention during the past decade both in research and industry as an appealing catalyst or a noninert support for catalysts, for instance, in the water-gas shift reaction and hydrogenation of the ketone group. Herein, the cerium oxide surface has been chosen to investigate the adsorption and decomposition behaviors of the N,N′-bis(1-ethylpropyl)-perylene-3,4,9,10-tetracarboxdiimide (EP-PTCDI) molecule by photoelectron spectroscopy. As expected, EP-PTCDI molecules self-assemble on the cerium oxide surface comprising both trivalent and tetravalent cerium at room temperature. Interestingly, the EP-PTCDI molecule exhibits selective adsorption on cerium oxide after the heating treatment. It was found that the ketone group of EP-PTCDI first undergoes hydrogenation after annealing to 400 °C, which is probably related to the fact that high temperature annealing provides sufficient thermal energy to trigger the reaction between the ketone group and trivalent cerium. Furthermore, EP-PTCDI molecules are discovered to start to decompose hierarchically on the ceria substrate from annealing at 400 °C due to the strong molecule–substrate interaction and the effective catalysis by the trivalent cerium, whereas the decomposition sequence of functional groups is revealed to be, first, the ethyl propyl group (−C5H9), followed by the hydrogenated ketone (alcohols) group. Finally, our study may provide a new platform for the fundamental understanding of complex organic reactions on the cerium oxide surface.