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Liu Y, Wei J, Yang Z, Zheng L, Zhao J, Song Z, Zhou Y, Cheng J, Meng J, Geng Z, Zeng J. Efficient tandem electroreduction of nitrate into ammonia through coupling Cu single atoms with adjacent Co 3O 4. Nat Commun 2024; 15:3619. [PMID: 38684692 PMCID: PMC11059385 DOI: 10.1038/s41467-024-48035-4] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/05/2023] [Accepted: 04/17/2024] [Indexed: 05/02/2024] Open
Abstract
The nitrate (NO3-) electroreduction into ammonia (NH3) represents a promising approach for sustainable NH3 synthesis. However, the variation of adsorption configurations renders great difficulties in the simultaneous optimization of binding energy for the intermediates. Though the extensively reported Cu-based electrocatalysts benefit NO3- adsorption, one of the key issues lies in the accumulation of nitrite (NO2-) due to its weak adsorption, resulting in the rapid deactivation of catalysts and sluggish kinetics of subsequent hydrogenation steps. Here we report a tandem electrocatalyst by combining Cu single atoms catalysts with adjacent Co3O4 nanosheets to boost the electroreduction of NO3- to NH3. The obtained tandem catalyst exhibits a yield rate for NH3 of 114.0 mgNH 3 h-1 cm-2, which exceeds the previous values for the reported Cu-based catalysts. Mechanism investigations unveil that the combination of Co3O4 regulates the adsorption configuration of NO2- and strengthens the binding with NO2-, thus accelerating the electroreduction of NO3- to NH3.
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Grants
- National Key Research and Development Program of China (2021YFA1500500, 2019YFA0405600),National Science Fund for Distinguished Young Scholars (21925204), CAS project for young scientists in basic research (YSBR-051), Collaborative Innovation Program of Hefei Science Center, CAS (2022HSC-CIP004), International Partnership Program of Chinese Academy of Sciences (123GJHZ2022101GC), the Joint Fund of the Yulin University and the Dalian National Laboratory for Clean Energy (YLU-DNL Fund 2022012), Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities
- China Postdoctoral Program for Innovative Talents (BX20200324)
- the Anhui Natural Science Foundation for Young Scholars (2208085QB41), and the Fellowship of China Postdoctoral Science Foundation (2021M693058)
- the Strategic Priority Research Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (XDB0450401),CAS project for young scientists in basic research (YSBR-022)
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Affiliation(s)
- Yan Liu
- Hefei National Research Center for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230026, Anhui, PR China
| | - Jie Wei
- Hefei National Research Center for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230026, Anhui, PR China
| | - Zhengwu Yang
- Hefei National Research Center for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230026, Anhui, PR China
| | - Lirong Zheng
- Institute of High Energy Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 100049, Beijing, PR China
| | - Jiankang Zhao
- Hefei National Research Center for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230026, Anhui, PR China
| | - Zhimin Song
- Hefei National Research Center for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230026, Anhui, PR China
| | - Yuhan Zhou
- Hefei National Research Center for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230026, Anhui, PR China
| | - Jiajie Cheng
- Department of Physics, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230026, Anhui, PR China
| | - Junyang Meng
- Hefei National Research Center for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230026, Anhui, PR China
| | - Zhigang Geng
- Hefei National Research Center for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230026, Anhui, PR China.
| | - Jie Zeng
- Hefei National Research Center for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230026, Anhui, PR China.
- CAS Key Laboratory of Strongly-Coupled Quantum Matter Physics, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230026, Anhui, PR China.
- Key Laboratory of Surface and Interface Chemistry and Energy Catalysis of Anhui Higher Education Institutes, Department of Chemical Physics, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230026, Anhui, PR China.
- School of Chemistry & Chemical Engineering, Anhui University of Technology, Ma'anshan, 243002, Anhui, PR China.
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