Photoreforming of Microplastics: Challenges and Opportunities for Sustainable Environmental Remediation.

Plastics are widely used in daily lives, but unfortunately, their inadequate recycling practices have led to the accumulation of microplastics in the environment, posing a threat to public health. The existing methods for treating microplastics are energy-intensive and environmentally damaging. In this context, photoreforming has emerged as a sustainable solution to address the microplastic crisis by simultaneously recycling them into value-added chemicals.

Strategies to Modulate the Copper Oxidation State Toward Selective C Production in the Electrochemical CO Reduction Reaction.

The electrochemical reduction of CO to form value-added chemicals receives considerable attention in recent years. Copper (Cu) is recognized as the only element capable of electro-reducing CO into hydrocarbons with two or more carbon atoms (C), but the low product selectivity of the Cu-based catalyst remains a major technological challenge to overcome. Therefore, identification of the structural features of Cu-based catalysts is of great importance for the highly selective production of C products (ethylene, ethanol, n-propanol, etc.

Intermetallic Nanoarchitectures for Efficient Electrocatalysis.

Intermetallic structures whose regular atomic arrays of constituent elements present unique catalytic properties have attracted considerable attention as efficient electrocatalysts for energy conversion reactions. Further performance enhancement in intermetallic catalysts hinges on constructing catalytic surfaces possessing high activity, durability, and selectivity. In this Perspective, we introduce recent endeavors to boost the performance of intermetallic catalysts by generating nanoarchitectures, which have well-defined size, shape, and dimension.

Polymer-Covered Copper Catalysts Alter the Reaction Pathway of the Electrochemical CO Reduction Reaction.

The electrochemical CO reduction reaction (CORR) has attracted considerable attention recently due to the potential conversion of atmospheric CO into useful organic products by utilizing electricity from renewable energy sources. However, the selective formation of desired products only via CORR has been elusive due to the presence of a myriad of competing reaction pathways, thus calling for effective strategies controlling the reaction coordinates. The control of binding energies of the reaction intermediate, such as *CO, is pivotal to manipulating reaction pathways, and various attempts have been made to accomplish this goal.

Chemical Fields: Directing Atom Migration in the Multiphasic Nanocrystal.

ConspectusAtoms in a bulk solid phase are usually trapped to fixed positions and can change their position only under certain conditions (e.g., at a melting point) due to the high energy barrier of migration between positions within the crystal lattice.

Mn-Dopant Differentiating the Ru and Ir Oxidation States in Catalytic Oxides Toward Durable Oxygen Evolution Reaction in Acidic Electrolyte.

Designing an efficient and durable electrocatalyst for the sluggish oxygen evolution reaction (OER) at the anode remains the foremost challenge in developing proton exchange membrane (PEM) electrolyzers. Here, a highly active and durable cactus-like nanoparticle with an exposed heterointerface between the IrO and the low oxidation state Ru by introducing a trace amount of Mn dopant is reported. The heterostructure fabrication relies on initial mixing of the Ru and Ir phases before electrochemical oxidation to produce a conjoined Ru/IrO heterointerface.

Pd Pb Nanosponges for Selective Conversion of Furfural to Furfuryl Alcohol under Mild Condition.

Alloy structures with high catalytic surface areas and tunable surface energies can lead to high catalytic selectivity and activities. Herein, the synthesis of sponge-like Pd Pb multiframes (Pd Pb MFs) is reported by using the thermodynamically driven phase segregation, which exhibit high selectivity (93%) for the conversion of furfural to furfuryl alcohol (FOL) under mild conditions. The excellent catalytic performance of the Pd Pb MF catalysts is attributed to the high surface area and optimized surface energy of the catalyst, which is associated with the introduction of Pb to Pd.

Intermetallic PtCu Nanoframes as Efficient Oxygen Reduction Electrocatalysts.

Nanoframe alloy structures represent a class of high-performance catalysts for the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR), owing to their high active surface area, efficient molecular accessibility, and nanoconfinement effect. However, structural and chemical instabilities of nanoframes remain an important challenge. Here, we report the synthesis of PtCu nanoframes constructed with an atomically ordered intermetallic structure (-PtCuNF/C) showing high ORR activity, durability, and chemical stability.

Catalytic Nanoframes and Beyond.

The ever-increasing need for the production and expenditure of sustainable energy is a result of the astonishing rate of consumption of fossil fuels and the accompanying environmental problems. Emphasis is being directed to the generation of sustainable energy by the fuel cell and water splitting technologies. Accordingly, the development of highly efficient electrocatalysts has attracted significant interest, as the fuel cell and water splitting technologies are critically dependent on their performance.

Carbon Transition-metal Oxide Electrodes: Understanding the Role of Surface Engineering for High Energy Density Supercapacitors.

Supercapacitors store electrical energy by ion adsorption at the interface of the electrode-electrolyte (electric double layer capacitance, EDLC) or through faradaic process involving direct transfer of electrons via oxidation/reduction reactions at one electrode to the other (pseudocapacitance). The present minireview describes the recent developments and progress of carbon-transition metal oxides (C-TMO) hybrid materials that show great promise as an efficient electrode towards supercapacitors among various material types. The review describes the synthetic methods and electrode preparation techniques along with the changes in the physical and chemical properties of each component in the hybrid materials.

Pt-Exchanged ZIF-8 nanocube as a solid-state precursor for L1-PtZn intermetallic nanoparticles embedded in a hollow carbon nanocage.

Nanoparticles with an atomically ordered alloy phase have received enormous attention for application as catalysts in fuel cells because of their unique electronic properties resulting from unusually strong d-orbital interactions between two metal components. However, the synthesis of intermetallic nanoparticles requires a high reaction temperature, thus necessitating the protection of nanoparticles with inorganic layers to prevent aggregation of nanoparticles during synthesis. The protective layer needs to be removed later for application as a catalyst, which is a cumbersome process.

Reactive nanotemplates for synthesis of highly efficient electrocatalysts: beyond simple morphology transfer.

Efficient electrocatalysts for energy conversion in general, and fuel cell operation and water electrolysis in particular, are pivotal for carbon-free hydrogen production. While the requirements of successful electrocatalysts include a high number density of catalytically active sites, high surface-to-volume ratio, inherently high catalytic activity, and robustness of the catalyst surface structure under harsh operating conditions, it is extremely difficult to synthesize nanocatalysts that could possess all these structural characteristics. Nanotemplate-mediated synthesis, namely, the coating or filling of a template with a desired material phase followed by the removal of the template, has captured the interest of researchers because of the ease of creating hollow-structured nanocatalysts with a high surface to volume ratio.