Enhancing local K adsorption by high-density cube corners for efficient electroreduction of CO to C products.

Reducing carbon dioxide (CO) to high value-added chemicals using renewable electricity is a promising approach to reducing CO levels in the air and mitigating the greenhouse effect, which depends on high-efficiency electrocatalysts. Copper-based catalysts can be used for electroreduction of CO to produce C products with high added value, but suffer from poor stability and low selectivity. Herein, we propose a strategy to enhance the field effect by varying the cubic corner density on the surface of CuO microspheres for improving the electrocatalytic performance of CO reduction to C products. Finite element method (FEM) simulation results show that the high density of cubic corners helps to enhance the local electric field, which increases the K concentration on the catalyst surface. The results of CO electroreduction tests show that the FE of the CuO catalyst with high-density cubic corners is 71% at a partial current density of 497 mA cm. Density functional theory (DFT) calculations reveal that CuO (111) and CuO (110) can effectively reduce the energy barrier of C-C coupling and improve the FE at high K concentrations relative to CuO (100). This study provides a new perspective for the design and development of efficient CORR catalysts.