A novel strategy to adjust the oxygen vacancy of CuO/MnO2 catalysts toward the catalytic oxidation of toluene

A facile and efficient solid-state redox strategy with low consumption was applied to modify the surface defect concentration of α-MnO2. The surficial reduction of α-MnO2 by Cu2O tremendously increased the concentration of oxygen vacancy of the as-synthesized CuO/MnO2-R catalyst, which significantly enhanced its catalytic performance for the combustion of toluene. The T90 of CuO/MnO2-R-10 catalyst obtained by strengthening surface defects was 36 °C and 32 °C lower than α-MnO2 and CuO/MnO2-10 catalyst, respectively, which could be contributed to the increase of structural defects. In addition, the reaction mechanism of toluene over the surface of CuO/MnO2-R-10 was also revealed by in-situ DRIFTS. Meanwhile, the CuO/MnO2-R-10 also exhibited excellent stability and resistance to water vapor and showed great potential in practical application.