Monitoring of CO Binding Sites on Stepped Pt Single Crystal Electrodes in Alkaline Solutions by in Situ FTIR Spectroscopy

Rationally Designed L12-Pt2RhFe Intermetallic Catalyst with High CO-Tolerance for Alkaline Methanol Electrooxidation

It is a grand challenge to deep understanding of and precise control over functional sites for the rational design of highly efficient catalysts for methanol electrooxidation. Here, an L12-Pt2RhFe intermetallic catalyst with integrated functional components is demonstrated, which exhibits exceptional CO tolerance. The Pt2RhFe/C achieves a superior mass activity of 6.43 A mgPt -1, which is 2.23-fold and 3.53-fold higher than those of PtRu/C and Pt/C. Impressively, the Pt2RhFe/C exhibits a significant enhancement in durability owing to its high CO-tolerance and stability. Density functional theory calculations reveal that high performance of Pt2RhFe intermetallic catalyst arises from the synergistic effect: the strong OH binding energy (OHBE) at Fe sites induce stably adsorbed OH species and thus facilitate the dehydrogenation step of methanol via rapid hydrogen transfer, while moderate OHBE at Rh sites promote the formation of the transition state (Pt-CO···OH-Rh) with a low activation barrier for CO removal. This work provides new insights into the role of OH binding strength in the removal of CO species, which is beneficial for the rational design of highly efficient catalysts.

Multi-band Metasurface-Driven Surface-Enhanced Infrared Absorption Spectroscopy for Improved Characterization of in-Situ Electrochemical Reactions

Surface-enhanced spectroscopy techniques are the method-of-choice to characterize adsorbed intermediates occurring during electrochemical reactions, which are crucial in realizing a green and sustainable future. Characterizing species with low coverage or short lifetimes has so far been limited by low signal enhancement. Recently, single-band metasurface-driven surface-enhanced infrared absorption spectroscopy (SEIRAS) has been pioneered as a promising technology to monitor a single vibrational mode during electrochemical CO oxidation. However, electrochemical reactions are complex, and their understanding requires the simultaneous monitoring of multiple adsorbed species in situ, hampering the adoption of nanostructured electrodes in spectro-electrochemistry. Here, we develop a multi-band nanophotonic-electrochemical platform that simultaneously monitors in situ multiple adsorbed species emerging during cyclic voltammetry scans by leveraging the high resolution offered by the reproducible nanostructuring of the working electrode. Specifically, we studied the electrochemical reduction of CO2 on a Pt surface and used two separately tuned metasurface arrays to monitor two adsorption configurations of CO with vibrational bands at ∼2030 and ∼1840 cm-1. Our platform provides a ∼40-fold enhancement in the detection of characteristic absorption signals compared to conventional broadband electrochemically roughened platinum films. A straightforward methodology is outlined starting with baselining our system in a CO-saturated environment and clearly detecting both configurations of adsorption. In contrast, during the electrochemical reduction of CO2 on platinum in K2CO3, CO adsorbed in a bridged configuration could not be detected. We anticipate that our technology will guide researchers in developing similar sensing platforms to simultaneously detect multiple challenging intermediates, with low surface coverage or short lifetimes.

CO organization at ambient pressure on stepped Pt surfaces: first principles modeling accelerated by neural networks

Step and kink sites at Pt surfaces have crucial importance in catalysis. We employ a high dimensional neural network potential (HDNNP) trained using first-principles calculations to determine the adsorption structure of CO under ambient conditions (T = 300 K and P = 1 atm) on these surfaces. To thoroughly explore the potential energy surface (PES), we use a modified basin hopping method. We utilize the explored PES to identify the adsorbate structures and show that under the considered conditions several low free energy structures exist. Under the considered temperature and pressure conditions, the step edge (or kink) is totally occupied by on-top CO molecules. We show that the step structure and the structure of CO molecules on the step dictate the arrangement of CO molecules on the lower terrace. On surfaces with (111) steps, like Pt(553), CO forms quasi-hexagonal structures on the terrace with the top site preferred, with on average two top site CO for one multiply bonded CO, while in contrast surfaces with (100) steps, like Pt(557), present a majority of multiply bonded CO on their terrace. Short terraced surfaces, like Pt(643), with square (100) steps that are broken by kink sites constrain the CO arrangement parallel to the step edge. Overall, this effort provides detailed analysis on the influence of the step edge structure, kink sites, and terrace width on the organization of CO molecules on non-reconstructed stepped surfaces, yielding initial structures for understanding restructuring events driven by CO at high coverages and ambient pressure.