Efficient Electrochemical CO2 Reduction via Nickel−Nitrogen Sites Hollow Carbon Spheres

After 19^th century, carbon dioxide (CO₂) and other green house gases has increased more amount of heat which have “trapped” in the earth's atmosphere and automatically global temperature rises. It causes significant climatic changes as well as the amount and frequency of precipitation. It can also increases in extreme weather conditions such as flooding, droughts, hurricanes, and wildfires. It also effects in ecosystem changes, rising sea levels, and food insecurity.

Carbon dioxide can be emitted from energy process raw materials, run computers, that have been used at factories and other facilities to run machines, heat and cool buildings, which are connected to the internet, etc.

CO₂ emissions can also be directly caused by leakage in the use of petroleum production, other industrial process and chemical reactions during the manufacturing process. Indirect emissions are observed from the energy production off-site, such as the emissions created by the power plants which facilities to get the electricity.

Scientists need to be focused on the reduction of CO₂ (excess) present in our atmosphere. In this field, it is more important because of reducing CO₂ into high value-added products as well as useful chemicals and the critical issues of CO₂ emission from fossil fuels. The electrochemical reduction of CO₂ (ERC) reaction is one of the effective finding on this field, but it can’t realize the conversion of carbon dioxide, however, it can also store intermittent renewable electricity by driving the ERC.

Currently many researches are going on “CO₂ reduction” but reducing CO₂ to high value-added chemicals is of high significance due to its vital role in mitigating CO₂ emission and energy crisis. Therefore new finding on robust catalysts with low overpotential, stability is extremely challenging of high selectivity.

The ERC reaction mainly needs an effective catalyst; in this case many types of catalysts are reported such as metals, metal oxides, metal alloys and metal chalcogenides. However, these catalysts are very expensive and inferior to activity and selectivity, accordingly within their limits of practical large-scale application. Therefore, carbon-based catalysts have intrigued enormous interest due to their high stability, conductivity, low cost and tunable porous structure.

Now-a-days, the transition metal (M = Ni, Fe, Co etc.) of single atom anchored on N-doped carbons (M−N−C) has demonstrated unexpected activity and selectivity for ERC reaction compared to other carbon based catalysts.

Prof. Xianfeng Li and his team have reported on a single Ni atom anchored with N-doped carbon (Ni−N−C) catalyst, which was designed and prepared via facile synthesis method to embed highly and evenly dispersed, coordinated unsaturated nickel−nitrogen active sites into a hollow carbon matrix with abundant micropores [1].

This reported catalyst possesses a unique electronic structure, maximized atomic utilization, and coordination environment. Also, this catalyst shows a higher intrinsic activity and remarkable selectivity for the ERC reaction. Further, the content of Ni and coordination structure can be easily modulated by changing the calcination temperature. It has also plays a vital role for the catalytical performance. From this research report, the Ni−N−C catalysts can be achieved over 90% for CO at a wide potential window from −0.6 to −1.0 V with a maximum value of 97% at −0.8 V. They have designed a facile way to develop high-performance single atomic catalysts with a tunable Ni−N coordination structure for CO₂ reduction.

Figure 1. Images of the Ni/N-doped hollow carbon spheres (HCSs) and Faradaic efficiencies (FEs) of CO at various applied potentials for Ni/N-HCS-T and N-HCS-1000 [1].

The porous carbon spheres have analogous behavior due to controlled porous structures, surface functionality, large surface area and high electrical conductivity. The main research finding of this work is that the high-density unsaturated Ni−N active sites can efficiently adsorb and activate CO₂, which can improve particularly the selectivity toward ERC products. In this case, maximum 97% of CO was obtained from ERC reaction.

The Ni-N-C catalyst possesses a high content of low-coordinated unsaturated Ni−N sites, electronic conductivity, and fast kinetics, which are beneficial to improve the electrocatalytic selectivity and activity and stability of the catalyst also plays a vital role for the CO₂ reduction reaction.

Our SNB team have mainly emphasize this new research article to enrich our viewer’s knowledge about the area of intense research on Efficient electro chemical CO₂ reduction via nickel−nitrogen sites hollow carbon spheres. Furthermore, their main research findings explains the following aspects viz., (i) A facile synthesis method embeds single-dispersed coordinatively unsaturated Ni−N active sites in a hollow carbon matrix with abundant micropores for the highly efficient CO₂ reduction reaction. (ii) Single Ni atom is attributed to the high N content of melamine. (iii) It can anchor Ni atoms to form the Ni−N active sites at a high temperature, and the abundant micropores of hollow carbon sphere and can absorb and confine hydrated Ni²⁺ into its micropores during the calcinating process, further preventing the aggregation of Ni atoms. (iv) Calcination temperature plays a vital role to change the coordination structure and content of Ni which can be easily modified on carbon hollow sphere. (v) From ERC reaction, the results can be achieved over 90% FE for CO at the wide potential window from −0.6 to −1.0 V and maximum CO obtained about 97% at −0.8 V, these catalyst have high content of the low-coordinated unsaturated Ni−N sites, high electronic conductivity, and fast kinetics. (vi) The ERC reaction is mainly to form CO₂^•− intermediate with fast electron transfer kinetics which can reduce the overpotential. (vii) The low coordinated unsaturated Ni−N sites can reduce the free energy of *COOH and also to promote the desorption step of *CO, which are beneficial to improve the electrocatalytic performance for ERC products. (viii) It also shows good durability of continuous reaction for 11 h.

Hence, these results paves a facile way to develop a nonprecious metal single-atom catalyst with a tunable coordinated environment and Ni loading for the electrocatalytic fields.

Reference

1. P. Yao et al., ACS Sustainable Chem. Eng. 9 (2021) 5437−5444.

--- Dr. A. S. Ganeshraja

Author Profile

Comments

A Biomimetic Eye with Perovskite Nanowire

The term “Biomimetics” derived from Ancient Greek, refers to life imitation. It is an interdisciplinary field in which comes from biology, engineering, and chemistry concepts. Biomimetics is applied to the synthesis of machines, or devices, which have functions that mimic real-life biological processes. Prof. Fan Zhiyoung , Department of Electronic and Computer Engineering, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Hong Kong SAR, China, and his team (from the University of California and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, USA) has reported on the effective biological eye results with a new development “Biomimetic Eye” with supportive components such as hemispherical shape retina and perovskite nanowires [1] . Our eyes possess exceptional image and sensing nature, which selectively express the wide field of view, resolution, and sensitivity [2] . A specialty of biomimetic eye parts with such highlighted characteristics is a desirable one, specifically in robotics

Pottery Shard CNTs Discovery in Sixth Century: Keeladi, Tamilnadu, India

Prof. Manivannan et al., and his research collaboration team have been investigated the discovery of carbon nanotubes in sixth century BC potteries that have obtained from Keeladi, Tamilandu, India. This investigation has reported in Nature publication journal of “Scientific Reports” on 13 th November 2020 [ 1 ]. This is one of the most interesting reports and scientific research from Keeladi excavation located in the southern part of India. Keeladi Excavation: The excavation was first started in Pallisanthai Thidal which is in the north of Manalur, about a kilometer east of the town of Keeladi in Sivagangai district, Tamilnadu, India. Number of various archaeological residues were found in this excavation, when plowing the land around the site. The first survey was conducted in 2013 in the vicinity of the Vaigai river, 293 sites were identified during the study including Keeladi, and all this sites have an archaeological residues [ 2 ]. A part of excavation, researchers found carbon

Bifunctional Water Splitting Catalysts: Large Current Density

Fuel cell technology is one of the most emerging fields with ecofriendly and everlasting energy source way of producing energy for the urgent requirements. Further it needs to be improved to make it cheap and more environmental friendly. Among all fuel cells, the hydrogen (H 2 ) and oxygen (O 2 ) fuel cell is the one with zero carbon emission, more ecofriendly, high potential and the byproduct is just only the water. However, supplying the fuels in the purest form (at least the H 2 ) is very essential to ensure higher life cycles and less decay in cell efficiency. Nowadays, commercially available large scale H 2 production is mainly dependent on steam reforming of fossil fuels which can also generates CO 2 along with H 2 and the source that is going to be depleted, and this byproduct is not environmental friendly. Therefore, an emerging alternate technology is needed; in this case the electrolysis of water has given a greater attention than the steam reforming. Recently many sc

Efficient Bio-Diesel Synthesis: Reusable Magnetic Catalysis

Prof. Anping Wang et al., with his research collaborative team from china ( 1. Guizhou University, China; and 2. Guizhou Normal University, China) and India (National Chemical Laboratory, India) have reviewed the research over views on the preparation methods, physicochemical properties, stabilization/functionalization, and the catalytic applications of magnetic materials, including magnetic acids, bases, enzymes, and acid-base bifunctional materials for the synthesis of bio-diesel. Here, we discuss only the preparation of efficient bio-diesel with merits and applications of magnetic nanocatalyst for the bio-diesel preparation . Bio-diesel products are mainly attain from bio mass feed stocks, which gives more attention in the biorefinery research affairs [1]. A green way of renewable liquid biofuels are emergency required one in present atmosphere. Among the various classes, best one is renewable diesel fuel, the chemical content of long-chain fatty acid methyl ester (FAME) or ethy

Threatened Species: An Alert of Red List from IUCN

International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) organization was established in 1964 to safeguard our natural species information details. This organization helps to identify the species when these are diminished due to abnormal issues in environmental forces or evolutionary changes in their population numbers. IUCN was recommended the information on the global risk status of plants, fungus, and animal species [1] . Overall world, the term “Biodiversity” and their conservation progress is an attentive one. As per IUCN, the announced Red List shows a critical condition of the world’s natural biodiversity. The major part of assessments representing on the Red List (in IU CN) are accounted out by following government/non-government members: Species Survival Commission (SSC). Red List Partners . Red List Authorities (RLAs). O ther specialists (who working on assessment projects). It gives information about the probable range, habitat, population size, ecology, threats, and co

Wearable Laser-Induced Graphene Mask

Prof. Ruquan Ye, from city University of Hong Kong and his collaboration with Prof. Chunlei Zhu, Ben Zhong Tang, and their research team have developed photo-thermally laser-induced graphene as a wearable mask with superior antibacterial capacity. Face masks have become a life-sustaining role in fighting against the outbreak of diseases like EBOLA and COVID-19. However, improper usage and disposal of masks may lead to secondary transmission around the globe. The vital role of the mask is a primary source to prevent us from COVID-19. In this pandemic situation, we must be alert about the used mask materials. The materials should safeguard us from COVID-19 as well as it must be bio-degradable material to safeguard around the world. The masks, currently available in the market are of single-use with/without filtering layers of thermoplastic materials like polypropylene. The degradation of these used masks takes at least 10 year

Hot Hole-Deriven Water Splitting via LSPR Metal Nanostructures

The localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR) in metal nanostructures is one of the most efficient materials for the futuristic energy, environmental science and industry. The new era is the ability to significantly drive and promote photocatalytic reactions and photodetection which acts as an interfacial energy transfer to adsorbate molecules and semiconductors. The combination of plasmonic noble metallic nanostructures with semiconductors for plasmon-enhanced visible light-driven water splitting (WS) has attracted considerable attention. WS is one of the most capable way to save solar energy into other useful energy applications. In WS, solar energy is converted to chemical energy mainly in the form of hydrogen and oxygen. Some of the review reports indicate that the highest reported quantum efficiency for overall WS achieved is 57% with NiO/NaTaO 3 :La photocatalyst under the excitation wavelength of 270 nm [1]. Its large scale commercial applications are still lacking due to

Micro-Alloying of ‘Stainless Mg’ via Ca: Exceptional Corrosion Resistance

German Scientists have established an alloy with ultra-high-purity of magnesium of exceptionally low corrosion rate– Stainless Magnesium approach, via alloying of pure magnesium (Mg) with a tiny amounts of calcium (Ca) has been reported in Materials Horizons on 24 th November 2020. Mg is found to be the lightest structural metal with various properties like high strength-to-weight ratio, excellent electrochemical characteristics, Young’s modulus similar to human bone with low cost. Mg is widely used in aerospace, electronic, automotive, biomedical and energy-storage applications owing to its high strength, low weight, and excellent electrochemical properties, due to its abundance in the earth’s crust. Particularly, Mg possess light weight than aluminium (Al) and makes attractive from a sustainable perspective. Therefore, replacing of Al with ‘ Stainless Mg ’ in flights and cars will reduce the fuel consumption with free of carbon dioxide emissions. However, its usage is limited and r

Giant Spontaneous Hall Effect Without a Magnet

Surprising phenomenon in the solid state physics was “ The Hall effect, which requires normally magnetic fields, can also be generated completely in a different way by without the magnet to give an extreme strength ” – Published by Sami Dzsabera et al., in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, on 19 th February 2021. Weyl–Kondo semimetal have been discovered recently, the three-dimensional (3D) Dirac cones that describes with massless relativistic quasiparticles, which was stabilized by breaking via either time-reversal symmetry (TRS) or inversion symmetry (IS). Sami Dzsabera et al., have reported the discovery of a giant spontaneous Hall effect in 3D materials, which have not only identifies an ideal technique. However, it will demonstrates a strong correlations that can drive extreme topological responses, which we can expect to trigger for future work. Further, they reported that the giant spontaneous Hall effect of semimetal seems to be the non-centrosymmetr

Designing of Corrosion Resistant Alloys via Percolation Theory

Canada and USA Scientists have reported on designing of corrosion-resistant alloys via percolation theory and published in Nature Materials on 01 February 2021. Nickel–chromium, Iron–chromium binary alloys can serve as the prototypical corrosion-resistant metals owing to its presence of a nanometre-thick protective passive oxide film. The main key criterion for good passive behavior is the passive film should be compromised via a scratch or abrasive wear that can be reformed with a little metal dissolution. This could be a principal reason for the stainless steels and other chromium containing alloys that are used for critical applications which ranges from nuclear reactor components to biomedical implants. A long-standing unanswered question in corrosion science is the unravelling of the compositional dependence of the electrochemical behavior of the alloys [ 1, 2 ]. The discovery of the family of these alloys were increased its rate with the advent of artificial intelligence, da

Search This Blog