Pt promotion and spill-over processes during deposition and desorption of upd-H(ad) and OH(ad) on Pt(x)Ru(1-x)/Ru(0001) surface alloys.

The electrochemical adsorption of underpotential deposited hydrogen (upd-H(ad)) and OH(ad) on structurally well-defined Pt(x)Ru(1-x)/Ru(0001) surface alloys was investigated by cyclic voltammetry and density functional theory (DFT) calculations. The adsorption energies of both upd-H(ad) and OH(ad) decrease with increasing Pt content in the adsorption ensemble, shifting the onset of upd-H(ad) and OH(ad) formation to increasingly cathodic and anodic potentials, respectively. For bare Ru(0001) and for Ru(3) sites in the surface alloy, the stability regions of these two species overlap or almost overlap, respectively. Similar to previous findings for upd-H(ad) adsorption/desorption on partly Pt monolayer island covered Ru(0001) surfaces (J. Phys. Chem. B 2004, 108, 14780), we find a sharp peak at approximately 100 mV vs. RHE in each scan direction, which is attributed to a Pt catalyzed OH(ad)<--> upd-H(ad) replacement on Ru(3) sites, via adsorption on Pt rich sites and spill-over to Ru(3) sites. The decrease of the integrated charge in these peaks with the third power of the Ru surface concentration, which for a random distribution of surface atoms reflects the availability of Ru(3) sites, supports the above assignment.