Effect of subsurface Ti-interstitials on the bonding of small gold clusters on rutile TiO2(110)

The density functional theory is used to examine the electronic structure of small Au clusters, supported on rutile TiO(2)(110) surfaces having subsurface Ti-interstitials. The interstitials reduce the surface and we find that negatively charged gold clusters are stabilized with respect to the stoichiometric surface. The behavior of the open-shell gold clusters can be rationalized in terms of the highest occupied molecular orbitals and the resulting electron affinities. The relative stabilities of closed-shell gold clusters led to recent disagreements in the literature. We show that they are very dependent on the density functional used. As expected, a redshift in the CO stretch vibration is calculated for CO adsorbed on a negatively charged cluster. Somewhat surprisingly a larger redshift is found for CO adsorbed on an overall positively charged Au(3) cluster. This is explained by CO being a local probe of the individual Au charges and one Au atom having an electron accumulation.