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Tuning of Silver Catalyst Mesostructure Promotes Selective Carbon Dioxide Conversion into Fuels
Author(s) -
Yoon Youngmin,
Hall Anthony Shoji,
Surendranath Yogesh
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
angewandte chemie international edition
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 5.831
H-Index - 550
eISSN - 1521-3773
pISSN - 1433-7851
DOI - 10.1002/anie.201607942
Subject(s) - selectivity , catalysis , materials science , carbon dioxide , electrode , chemical engineering , surface roughness , nanotechnology , chemistry , composite material , organic chemistry , engineering
Abstract An electrode's performance for catalytic CO 2 conversion to fuels is a complex convolution of surface structure and transport effects. Using well‐defined mesostructured silver inverse opal (Ag‐IO) electrodes, it is demonstrated that mesostructure‐induced transport limitations alone serve to increase the turnover frequency for CO 2 activation per unit area, while simultaneously improving reaction selectivity. The specific activity for catalyzed CO evolution systematically rises by three‐fold and the specific activity for catalyzed H 2 evolution systematically declines by ten‐fold with increasing mesostructural roughness of Ag‐IOs. By exploiting the compounding influence of both of these effects, we demonstrate that mesostructure, rather than surface structure, can be used to tune CO evolution selectivity from less than 5 % to more than 80 %. These results establish electrode mesostructuring as a powerful complementary tool for tuning both catalyst selectivity and efficiency for CO 2 conversion into fuels.