TY - JOUR
T1 - Heteroatom-Doped Carbon Materials for Electrocatalysis
AU - Asefa, Tewodros
AU - Huang, Xiaoxi
N1 - Funding Information:
T.A. thanks the financial assistance of the US National Science Foundation (NSF DMR-1508611) that allowed him to continue the line of research discussed in this Concept Article. T.A. also acknowledges the members of past and present Asefa group who were involved in research in sustainable carbon-based nanocatalysts and nanocatalysis in his group over the past 6 years.
PY - 2017/8/10
Y1 - 2017/8/10
N2 - Fuel cells, water electrolyzers, and metal-air batteries are important energy systems that have started to play some roles in our renewable energy landscapes. However, despite much research works carried out on them, they have not yet found large-scale applications, mainly due to the unavailability of sustainable catalysts that can catalyze the reactions employed in them. Currently, noble metal-based materials are the ones that are commonly used as catalysts in most commercial fuel cells, electrolyzers, and metal-air batteries. Hence, there has been considerable research efforts worldwide to find alternative noble metal-free and metal-free catalysts composed of inexpensive, earth-abundant elements for use in the catalytic reactions employed in these energy systems. In this concept paper, a brief introduction on catalysis in renewable energy systems, followed by the recent efforts to develop sustainable, heteroatom-doped carbon and non-noble metal-based electrocatalysts, the challenges to unravel their structure-catalytic activity relationships, and the authors’ perspectives on these topics and materials, are discussed.
AB - Fuel cells, water electrolyzers, and metal-air batteries are important energy systems that have started to play some roles in our renewable energy landscapes. However, despite much research works carried out on them, they have not yet found large-scale applications, mainly due to the unavailability of sustainable catalysts that can catalyze the reactions employed in them. Currently, noble metal-based materials are the ones that are commonly used as catalysts in most commercial fuel cells, electrolyzers, and metal-air batteries. Hence, there has been considerable research efforts worldwide to find alternative noble metal-free and metal-free catalysts composed of inexpensive, earth-abundant elements for use in the catalytic reactions employed in these energy systems. In this concept paper, a brief introduction on catalysis in renewable energy systems, followed by the recent efforts to develop sustainable, heteroatom-doped carbon and non-noble metal-based electrocatalysts, the challenges to unravel their structure-catalytic activity relationships, and the authors’ perspectives on these topics and materials, are discussed.
KW - carbon nanomaterial
KW - catalysis
KW - electrocatalysis
KW - heteroatom-doped carbon
KW - renewable energy
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U2 - 10.1002/chem.201700439
DO - 10.1002/chem.201700439
M3 - Article
C2 - 28397303
AN - SCOPUS:85021415007
VL - 23
SP - 10703
EP - 10713
JO - Chemistry - A European Journal
JF - Chemistry - A European Journal
SN - 0947-6539
IS - 45
ER -