Abstract :
The article reports the high activity of nanostructured Ru/ceria (Ru-clusters/ceria) in the ethylene methoxycarbonylation (EMC) reaction in the absence of acid promoter.The interfacial Lewis acid-base pair [Ru-O-Ce-Vo], which consists of acidic Ce-Vo (oxygen vacancy) site and basic interfacial oxygen of Ru-O-Ce linkage, acts as active site for the dissociation of methanol and the subsequent transfer of hydrogen to the activated ethylene.The combination of 1H MAS NMR, pyridine-IR and DFT calculations reveals the hydrogen species derived from methanol contains Bronsted acidity.