Christoph J Kaul, Lukas Lätsch, Alexander V Yakimov, Milivoj Plodinec, Xing Huang, Trees De Baerdemaeker, Jaroslaw Mormul, Peter Oechsle, Andrei-Nicolae Parvulescu, J Henrique Teles, Christophe Copéret
Ti-MWW is an important member of Ti-containing zeolites, industrially employed as heterogeneous catalyst for selective oxidations. However, the development of more active variants is often hampered by the lack of characterization methods able to track transformations and interplay between a multitude of species; this is further exacerbated by the use of post-synthetic modifications. Combining microscopy and various spectroscopic techniques show that the promotional role of Zn is closely linked to its healing of hydrophilic silanol nests, while simultaneously generating small TiOx clusters. Notably, these changes are accompanied by Ti weight loading dependent modifications of the extra-framework TiO2 and formation of Zn species. Overall, our study not only highlights the interplay between a plethora of species, but enables a more rational development of post-modification of Ti-containing zeolites.