单纳米粒子表面的甲醇电催化氧化过程

由于全球资源短缺和环境污染等问题日益加剧,开发利用洁净高效的新能源已成为当今社会研究热点.其中,直接甲醇燃料电池(DMFC)具有低温启动、无需重整制氢、洁净环保和体积小巧等特性,展现出较好的应用前景.DMFC的阳极反应为甲醇氧化反应,甲醇的完全氧化涉及到复杂的六步电子转移反应过程.揭示甲醇氧化的反应路径与机理,阐明催化剂的真实活性中心以及毒化效应,对于高效催化剂的设计和制备至关重要.随着纳米技术的发展,在单颗粒水平对纳米催化剂进行表征受到了越来越多的关注.因此,亟需发展具有高灵敏度的原位界面表征方法,实现纳米尺度的精准测量,排除催化剂平均效应,获取纳米表界面真实的催化反应信息.本文结合纳米等离子共振散射光谱与电化学技术,获得了单个纳米催化剂的同步光电响应信号,实现单颗粒水平纳米粒子表面化学、电化学反应过程(如电荷转移、分子吸附等)的高灵敏监测,揭示纳米尺度表界面催化反应机制.利用这一技术,动态监测了单个金/铂包金纳米颗粒表面的甲醇氧化过程.结果表明,在金纳米颗粒表面,甲醇氧化主要通过HCOOH路径,生成产物为HCOOH或CO_(2).其中,反应中间体与羟基离子的竞争性吸附起到重要作用,反应决速步为Au-OH和Au-CHO的共吸附.而铂催化甲醇氧化主要经过CO路径,决速步为Pt-OH和Pt-CO氧化生成Pt-COOH过程.此外,观测到金和铂氢氧化物为催化反应的活性物种,进一步证实了金属氧化物对于催化活性的钝化作用.结合密度泛函理论模拟,明确了甲醇氧化反应中间体吸附与金属氢氧化物演变之间的内在联系.综上,本文利用纳米等离子共振散射光谱,原位监测了单个纳米粒子表面的甲醇电催化氧化过程,实现了催化剂真实活性物种演变与失活过程的直接观测,揭示了不同催化剂表面的决速步骤,为提高催化反应效率提供了更加准确的反应信息.本文将有益于纳米等离子共振散射光谱在电催化反应高灵敏监测方面的广泛应用,并为高效甲醇催化剂的制备提供参考.

New Strategy for Boosting Cathodic Performance of Protonic Ceramic Fuel Cells Through Incorporating a Superior Hydronation Second Phase

For protonic ceramic fuel cells,it is key to develop material with high intrinsic activity for oxygen activation and bulk proton conductivity enabling water formation at entire electrode surface.However,a higher water content which benefitting for the increasing proton conductivity will not only dilute the oxygen in the gas,but also suppress the O_(2)adsorption on the electrode surface.Herein,a new electrode design concept is proposed,that may overcome this dilemma.By introducing a second phase with high-hydrating capability into a conventional cobalt-free perovskite to form a unique nanocomposite electrode,high proton conductivity/concentration can be reached at low water content in atmosphere.In addition,the hydronation creates additional fast proton transport channel along the two-phase interface.As a result,high protonic conductivity is reached,leading to a new breakthrough in performance for proton ceramic fuel cells and electrolysis cells devices among available air electrodes.

Understanding the origin of high oxygen evolution reaction activity in the high Sr-doped perovskite

Effective electrocatalysis is crucial for enhancing the efficiency of water splitting to obtain clean fuels.Herein,we report a system of interesting and high-performance Sr-doped perovskite electrocatalysts with porous structures,obtained via a facile molten salt method and applied in the oxygen evolution reaction(OER).With increasing the Sr content,the valence states of Co and Fe ions do not clearly increase,according to the Co-L2,3 and Fe-L2,3 as well as the Co-K and the Fe-K X-ray absorption spectroscopy,whereas doped holes are clearly observed in the 0-K edge.High-resolution transmission electron microscopy indicates the appearance of an amorphous layer after the electrochemical reaction.We conclude that the formation of the amorphous layer at the surface,induced by Sr doping,is crucial for achieving high OER activity,and we offer insights into the self-reconstruction of the OER catalyst.

Enhanced H_(2) permeation and CO_(2) tolerance of self-assembled ceramic-metal-ceramic BZCYYb-Ni-CeO_(2) hybrid membrane for hydrogen separation

Perovskite-type mixed protonic-electronic conducting membranes have attracted attention because of their ability to separate and purify hydrogen from a mixture of gases generated by industrial-scale steam reforming based on an ion diffusion mechanism.Exploring cost-effective membrane materials that can achieve both high H_(2) permeability and strong CO_(2)-tolerant chemical stability has been a major challenge for industrial applications.Herein,we constructed a triple phase(ceramic-metal-ceramic)membrane composed of a perovskite ceramic phase BaZr_(0.1)Ce_(0.7)Y_(0.1)Yb_(0.1)O_(3-δ)(BZCYYb),Ni metal phase and a fluorite ceramic phase CeO_(2).Under H_(2) atmosphere,Ni metal in-situ exsolved from the oxide grains,and decorated the grain surface and boundary,thus the electronic conductivity and hydrogen separation performance can be promoted.The BZCYYbNi-CeO_(2)hybrid membrane achieved an exceptional hydrogen separation performance of 0.53 mL min^(-1)cm^(-2) at 800℃ under a 10 vol% H_(2) atmosphere,surpassing all other perovskite membranes reported to date.Furthermore,the CeO_(2) phase incorporated into the BZCYYb-Ni effectively improved the CO_(2)-tolerant chemical stability.The BZCYYbNi-CeO_(2) membrane exhibited outstanding long-term stability for at least 80 h at 700℃ under 10 vol%CO_(2)-10 vol%H_(2).The success of hybrid membrane construction creates a new direction for simultaneously improving their hydrogen separation performance and CO_(2) resistance stability.

An Amidoximated-UHMEPE Fiber for Selective and High Efficient Removal of Uranyl and Thorium from Acid Aqueous Solution

High efficient removal and recovery of uranium and thorium from nuclear waste solution are essential for environmental preservation and fuel recycle. A new polymer fiber adsorbent (UHMEPE-g-PAO fiber), prepared by amidoximation of grafted polyacrylonitrile onto Ultra High Molecular Weight Polyethylene (UHMWPE) fiber, was used to remove the uranyl and thorium ions from acid aqueous solutions and its performance was carefully investigated. It was found that uranyl ion can penetrate the fiber through the connected pore structures, forming (UO2) (R-C(NH2)-NO)2 chelates with the amidoxime groups within the fiber. Two amidoxime groups (U-N and U-Oeq) and two water molecules (U-Oeq2) are bound to uranyl ion in the fiber. On the contrary, thorium ions are adsorbed mainly on the fiber surface in the form of Th(OH)4 precipitate that blocks the entrance of Th4+ ion into fiber pores. The maximum included other two capacities of uranyl and thorium ions were estimated to be 262.01 mg/g and 160 mg/g at room temperature with pH 3.0, respectively. The results also indicate that the UHMWPE-g-PAO fiber has higher adsorption selectivity for uranyl ion than thorium ion. Uranium and thorium oxide particles were obtained as the ultimate product after sintering of the fiber adsorbent. This novel and environmentally friendly adsorption process is feasible to extract uranium or thorium from acidic aqueous solution.

SYBR Green I-based product-enhanced reverse transcriptase assay for quantification of retroviral PFV and detection of the divalent cation preference of PFV RT

Dear Editor,Prototype foamy virus(PFV)belongs to the genus Spumavirus in the Spumaretrovirinae subfamily of Retroviridae.Although PFV and HIV have much in common,research into PFV has lagged far behind that into HIV,as PFV appeared to be non-pathogenic both in accidentally infected humans and in experimentally infected animals.In recent decades,however,more attention has been focused on PFV because it seems to be

Molten salt-assisted synthesis of bulk CoOOH as a water oxidation catalyst

Different sizes of layered CoOOH were synthesized by the molten-salt-assisted method at different temperatures.X-ray diffraction and scanning electron microscope studies reveal that CoOOH grew at(003)with increasing temperature,and its size can reach dozens of microns.X-ray absorption near edge structure and XPS studies demonstrate that the Co valence state of CoOOH-750 is trivalent,and X-ray Absorption Fine Structure shows that it had a higher symmetry and lower disorder degree,indicating that CoOOH-750 has higher crystallinity and Co3+.The results of electrochemical tests show that CoOOH-750 exhibited the best oxygen-evolution-reaction(OER)catalytic activity.

Copper‐doped nickel oxyhydroxide for efficient electrocatalytic ethanol oxidation

Rational design of low‐cost and efficient electrocatalysts for ethanol oxidation reaction(EOR)is imperative for electrocatalytic ethanol fuel cells.In this work,we developed a copper‐doped nickel oxyhydroxide(Cu‐doped NiOOH)catalyst via in situ electrochemical reconstruction of a NiCu alloy.The introduction of Cu dopants increases the specific surface area and more defect sites,as well as forms high‐valence Ni sites.The Cu‐doped NiOOH electrocatalyst exhibited an excellent EOR performance with a peak current density of 227 mA·cm^(–2)at 1.72 V versus reversible hydrogen electrode,high Faradic efficiencies for acetate production(>98%),and excellent electrochemical stability.Our work suggests an attractive route of designing non‐noble metal based electrocatalysts for ethanol oxidation.

Efficient CO_(2) fixation with acetophenone on Ag-CeO_(2) electrocatalyst by a double activation strategy

The electrocarboxylation reaction is an attractive means to convert CO_(2) into valuable chemicals under ambient conditions,while it still suffers from low efficiency due to the high stability of CO_(2).In this work,we report a double activation strategy for simultaneously activating CO_(2) and acetophenone by silver-doped CeO_(2)(Ag-CeO_(2)) nanowires,featuring as an effective electrocatalyst for electrocarboxylation of acetophenone with CO_(2).Compared to the Ag foil,Ag nanoparticles and CeO_(2) nanowires,the Ag-CeO_(2)nanowire catalyst allowed to reduce the onset potential difference between CO_(2) and acetophenone activation,thus enabling efficient electrocarboxylation to form 2-phenyllactic acid.The Faradaic efficiency for producing 2-phenyllactic acid reached 91%at−1.8 V versus Ag/AgI.This double activation strategy of activating both CO_(2)and organic substrate molecules can benefit the catalyst design to improve activities and selectivities in upgrading CO_(2)fixation for higher-value electrocarboxylation.

The first observation of Ni nanoparticle exsolution from YSZ and its application for dry reforming of methane

Ni nanocatalysts produced through exsolution have shown strong resistance to particle sintering and carbon coking in a beneficial dry reforming of methane(DRM)reaction utilizing greenhouse gases such as CH_(4)and CO_(2).However,most of the existing oxide supports for exsolution have been limited to perovskite oxide,while studies on fluorite support have been rarely conducted due to the limited solubility despite its excellent redox stability.Here we demonstrate that 3 mol%Ni can be successfully dissolved into the yttria-stabilized zirconia(YSZ)lattice and be further exsolved to the surface in a reducing atmosphere.The YSZ decorated with exsolved Ni nanoparticles shows enhanced catalytic activity for DRM reaction compared to the conventional cermet type of bulk Ni-YSZ.Moreover,the catalytic activity is extremely stable for about 300 h without significant degradation.Overall results suggest that the YSZ-based fluorite structure can be utilized as one of the support oxides for exsolution.

Molten-salt synthesis of porous La0.6Sr0.4Co0.2Fe0.8O2.9 perovskite as an efficient electrocatalyst for oxygen evolution

The development of an efficient and low-cost electrocatalyst for the oxygen evolution reaction （OER） via an eco-efficient route is a desirable, although challenging, outcome for overall water splitting. Herein, an iron-rich La0.6Sr0.4Co0.2Fe0.8O2.9 （LSCF28） perovskite with an open porous topographic structure was developed as an electrocatalyst by a straightforward molten-salt synthesis approach. It was found that porosity correlates with both the iron content and the molten-salt approach. Benefiting from the large surface area, high activity of the porous internal surface, and the optimal electronic configuration of redox sites, this inexpensive material exhibits high performance with a large mass activity of 40.8A·g^-1 at a low overpotential of 0.345 V in 0.1 M KOH, surpassing the state-of-the-art precious metal IrO2 catalyst and other well-known perovskites, such as Ba0.5Sr0.5Co0.8Fe0.2O3 and SRCoO2.7. Our work illustrates that the molten- salt method is an effective route to generate porous structures in perovskite oxides, which is important for energy conversion and storage devices.