Crozier Research Group @ ASU

Department of Materials Science and Engineering.
School for the Engineering of Matter, Transport, and Energy. Arizona State University (ASU)

Dr. Peter Crozier has been an active member of the electron microscopy community for over 30 years, making significant contributions to the fields of in-situ microscopy, in-operando microscopy, and vibrational electron energy loss spectroscopy (EELS). The Crozier group conducts research largely in the field of catalysis, across a wide range of materials systems, structures, and length scales. They are key users and supporters of the John M. Cowley Center for High-Resolution Electron Microscopy—one of the world's leading electron microscopy facilities. Moreover, the entire group actively participates in outreach and mentorship of the microscopy community by organizing and leading events at ASU and national conferences.

Recent Work

Recent work from the group focuses on understanding the effects that atomic-scale composition and structure of different materials have on their catalytic activity. For example, the group used vibrational EELS to examine graphitic carbon nitride photocatalysts and in-situ environmental TEM (ETEM) to examine the interfacial behavior between catalysts and their support.

Dr. Crozier presented part of his group’s in-situ ETEM work in the Gatan webinar “In-Situ Electron Energy Loss Spectroscopy for Nanoscale Characterization of Materials Dynamics.” He showed how in-situ ETEM was used to observe the localized structural evolution of a Ni/CeO2 system under different gas flow conditions. Specifically, varying gas composition while heating the Ni/CeO2 to 550°C resulted in different carbon growth behavior at the nanocatalyst interfaces. Ethylene (C2H4) gas flow resulted in graphite formation on the Ni nanoparticle surface, whereas ethane (C2H6) gas flow instead resulted in the amorphization of CeO2 due to oxygen-induced reaction with C2H6. These results highlight key catalytic behavior of the Ni/CeO2 system when used for hydrocarbon reforming.

Find more information about the Crozier group and their research on their group website. https://crozier.engineering.asu.edu/ 

Watch Dr. Crozier’s webinar on In-Situ EELS 

Publications

https://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/acsanm.8b00102