About
Ph.D., University of Washington, Physics
B.S., Brigham Young University, Honors Physics
Research
Prof. Tait's current research focuses on supramolecular self-assembly at surfaces and single-atom catalysis. Our group studies functional nanometer-scale molecular architectures at surfaces formed by self-assembly of organic building blocks. This research combines the understanding of growth kinetics and materials characterization of physical and analytical chemistry with the rich building block library and supramolecular organization schemes of organic and inorganic chemistry. We also examine metal-ligand complex formation at surfaces and how these can be applied to address challenges in catalysis. We are actively studying single-atom catalyst systems formed by metal-ligand coordination that exhibit high reaction selectivity. We apply a variety of surface analysis methods to develop and characterize these systems. These studies have the potential to open up new opportunities and new technologies in many fields, including molecular electronics, catalysis, molecular recognition/sensors and magnetism.
Publications
1. Fereshteh Rezvani, Dave Austin, Duy Le, Talat S. Rahman,* Steven L. Tait,* “Ligand-Coordinated Pt Single-Atom Catalyst Facilitates Support-Assisted Water-Gas Shift Reaction,” Journal of Catalysis, 438, 115723 (2024). DOI: 10.1016/j.jcat.2024.115723
2. Yan Li, Henry D. Castillo, James R. Dobscha, Amanda R. Morgan, Steven L. Tait, and Amar H. Flood,* “Breaking Radial Dipole Symmetry in Planar Macrocycles Modulates Edge-edge Packing and Disrupts Cofacial Stacking,” Chemistry – A European Journal, 30, e202302946 (2024). DOI: 10.1002/chem.202302946
3. Eman Wasim, Naseem Ud Din, Duy Le, Xuemei Zhou, Michael S. Pape, George E. Sterbinsky, Talat S. Rahman,* Steven L. Tait,* “Ligand-Coordination Effects on the Selective Hydrogenation of Acetylene in Single-site Pd-Ligand Supported Catalysts,” Journal of Catalysis, 413, 81-92 (2022). DOI: 10.1016/j.jcat.2022.06.010
4. Xuemei Zhou, George E. Sterbinsky, Eman Wasim, Linxiao Chen, and Steven L. Tait,* “Tuning Ligand-coordinated Single Metal Atoms on TiO2 and their Dynamic Response during Hydrogenation Catalysis,” ChemSusChem 14, 3825-3837 (2021). DOI: 10.1002/cssc.202100208
5. Honghe Ding, Bairu Li, Shah Zareen, Guihang Li, Yi Tu, Dongling Zhang, Xu Cao, Qian Xu, Shangfeng Yang, Steven L. Tait, and Junfa Zhu,* “In-situ Investigations of Al/Perovskite Interfacial Structures,” ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces, 12, 28861-28868 (2020). DOI: 10.1021/acsami.0c06458
6. David L. Wisman, Seyong Kim, Tobias W. Morris, Jihwan Choi, Christopher D. Tempas, Colleen Q. Trainor, Dongwhan Lee,* and Steven L. Tait,* “Surface Self-Assembly, Film Morphology, and Charge Transport Properties of Semiconducting Triazoloarenes,” Langmuir, 35, 6304-6311 (2019). DOI: 10.1021/acs.langmuir.9b00512
7. Tobias W. Morris, I. J. Huerfano, Miao Wang, David L. Wisman, Alyssa C. Cabelof, Naseem U. Din, Christopher D. Tempas, Duy Le, Alexander V. Polezhaev, Talat S. Rahman,* Kenneth G. Caulton,* Steven L. Tait,* Multi-electron Reduction Capacity and Multiple Binding Pockets in Metal-organic Redox Assembly at Surfaces, Chemistry – a European Journal, 25, 5565-5573 (2019). DOI: 10.1002/chem.201900002.
8. H. D. Castillo, J. M. Espinosa-Duran, J. R. Dobscha, D. C. Ashley, S. Debnath, B. E. Hirsch, S. R. Schrecke, M.-H. Baik, P. J. Ortoleva, K. Raghavachari, A. H. Flood, and S. L. Tait,* “Amphiphile Self-assembly Dynamics at the Solution-solid Interface Reveal Asymmetry in Head/tail Desorption,” Chemical Communications, 54, 10076-10079 (2018). DOI: 10.1039/C8CC04465A
9. C. D. Tempas, T. W. Morris, D. L. Wisman, N. U. Din, D. Le, C. G. Williams, M. Wang, A. V. Polezhaev, T. S. Rahman, K. G. Caulton,* and S. L. Tait,* “Redox-active Ligand Controlled Selectivity of Vanadium Oxidation on Au(100),”
Chemical Science, 9, 1674-1685 (2018). DOI: 10.1039/c7sc04752e
10. B. E. Hirsch, K. P. McDonald, S. L. Tait,* and A. H. Flood,* “Physical and Chemical Model of Ion Stability and Movement within the Dynamic and Voltage-gated STM Tip-surface Tunneling Junction,” Faraday Discussions, 204, 159-172 (2017). DOI: 10.1039/c7fd00104e
11. C. G. Williams, M. Wang, D. Skomski, C. D. Tempas, L. L. Kesmodel, and S. L. Tait,* “Dehydrocyclization of Peripheral Alkyl Groups in Porphyrins at Cu(100) and Ag(111) Surfaces,” Surface Science, 653, 130-137 (2016).
DOI: 10.1016/j.susc.2016.06.013
12. B. E. Hirsch, K. P. McDonald, A. H. Flood,* and S. L. Tait,* “Living on the Edge: Tuning Supramolecular Interactions to Design Two-dimensional Organic Crystals near the Boundary of Two Stable Structural Phases,” Journal of Chemical Physics, 142, 101914 (2015). DOI: 10.1063/1.4906895
13. D. Skomski, J. Jo, C. D. Tempas, S. Kim, D. Lee,* and S. L. Tait,* “High-Fidelity Self-Assembly of Crystalline and Parallel-Oriented Organic Thin Films by π–π Stacking from a Metal Surface,” Langmuir, 30, 10050-10056 (2014). DOI: 10.1021/la502288v
14. D. Skomski, C. D. Tempas, K. A. Smith, and S. L. Tait,* “Redox-Active On-Surface Assembly of Metal-Organic Chains with Single-Site Pt(II),” Journal of the American Chemical Society, 136, 9862-9865 (2014). DOI: 10.1021/ja504850f
15. B. E. Hirsch, K. P. McDonald, B. Qiao, A. H. Flood,* and S. L. Tait,* “Selective Anion-Induced Crystal Switching and Binding in Surface Monolayers Modulated by Electric Fields from Scanning Probes,” ACS Nano, 8, 10858-10869 (2014). DOI: 10.1021/nn504685t
16. D. Skomski, S. Abb, and S. L. Tait,* “Robust Surface Nano-Architecture by Alkali-Carboxylate Ionic Bonding,” Journal of the American Chemical Society, 134, 14165-14171 (2012). DOI: 10.1021/ja3053128
17. T.-C. Tseng, C. Urban, Y. Wang, R. Otero,* S. L. Tait,* M. Alcami, D. Ecija, M. Trelka, J. M. Gallego, N. Lin, M. Konuma, U. Starke, A. Nefedov, C. Woell, M. A. Herranz, F. Martin, N. Martin, K. Kern, R. Miranda, “Charge Transfer-induced Structural Rearrangements at Both Sides of Organic/Metal Interfaces,” Nature Chemistry, 2, 374-379 (2010). DOI: 10.1038/nchem.591