The combustion of propane over bimetallic Ru-Re/gamma-Al2O3 catalysts with the Ru/Re atomic ratio of 90/10, 75/25 and 50/50 has been investigated. The catalysts were synthesized by co-impregnation method using Ru(NO)(NO3)(3) and NH4ReO4 as metal precursors. Techniques such as H-2-TPR, XRD, SEM, TEM, XPS and 02 adsorption were used to characterize the catalysts. All the bimetallic catalysts contained highly dispersed RuRe alloy nanoparticles (<3 nm) and at Ru/Re =50/50 also Re particles (similar to 8 nm). The catalysts with the Ru/Re atomic ratio 90/10 and 75/25 (Re loading <= 3 wt.%) exhibited higher activity in the propane combustion than the Ru catalyst. The improvement of the activity was related to better reducibility of the metal oxide species and higher dispersion of an active RuOx phase. The catalyst with the Ru/Re atomic ratio of 50/50 (Re loading of 9.2 wt.%) exhibited lower activity because the ruthenium phase was partly blocked by inactive ReOx species. The addition of Re significantly suppressed Ru particle sintering in the Ru-Re/gamma-Al2O3 catalysts. This causes that deactivation of the bimetallic Ru-Re catalysts under O-2-rich reaction conditions was significantly lower than that of the monometallic Ru-Re/gamma-Al2O3 catalyst. (C) 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.