CO and O-2 chemisorption on Mo- and C-terminated faces of alpha -Mo2C (0001
) was investigated. CO adsorbs molecularly, and thermal desorption spectros
copy (TDS) studies indicate one CO chemisorption state with an apparent fir
st-order activation energy for desorption of 93 kJ mol(-1) at saturation co
verage. O-2 adsorbs dissociatively, resulting in a(1 x 1)rectangular overla
yer on the Mo-terminated surface. CO is the only thermal desorption product
detected from an oxygen-saturated surface, yielding a low temperature deso
rption-limited feature and a high temperature reaction-limited feature. How
ever. the majority (similar to 85%) of the surface oxygen does not burn off
as CO, but instead diffuses into the sample bulk. For the C-terminated sur
face, the CO and O-2 saturation coverages are not significantly altered. Re
lative surface coverages based on the total number of surface Mo atoms are
14% for CO and 50% for oxygen atoms. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rig
hts reserved.