Engineering sodium‐decorated bifunctional Au‐Ti sites to boost molecular transfer for propene epoxidation with H2 and O2

Regulating the microenvironment of active sites is crucial to boost the performance of direct propene epoxidation with H2 and O2. Herein, the enhanced surface transfer of H2O2 intermediates was first achieved by sodium‐decorated Au‐Ti bifunctional active sites. Combined with multi‐techniques (e.g., operando UV–vis–NIR system, DFT studies and quantitative model calculations), it is found that the sodium‐decorated silanols (Si‐ONa species) on the TS‐1 support enhance the formation of Ti‐OOH intermediates by restraining H2O2 decomposition. In addition, sodium‐decorated silanols improves the desorption of propylene oxide, suppressing its ring‐opening and formation for the carbonaceous deposits. Moreover, the sodium‐decorated Au nanoparticles with smaller diameter and higher electron density further strengthen O2 adsorption and boost the H2O2 formation. This work not only provides fundamental understandings on the microenvironment of Au‐Ti bifunctional catalysts but also sheds new light on enhancing the performance by boosting the surface molecular transfer.