Premium
Cover Feature: Ambient Electrosynthesis of Ammonia on a Core–Shell‐Structured Au@CeO 2 Catalyst: Contribution of Oxygen Vacancies in CeO 2 (Chem. Eur. J. 23/2019)
Author(s) -
Liu Guoqiang,
Cui Zhiqing,
Han Miaomiao,
Zhang Shengbo,
Zhao Cuijiao,
Chen Chun,
Wang Guozhong,
Zhang Haimin
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
chemistry – a european journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.687
H-Index - 242
eISSN - 1521-3765
pISSN - 0947-6539
DOI - 10.1002/chem.201901085
Subject(s) - electrocatalyst , catalysis , electrosynthesis , redox , nanoparticle , oxygen , chemical engineering , chemistry , ammonia production , oxygen evolution , ammonia , materials science , inorganic chemistry , electrochemistry , nanotechnology , electrode , organic chemistry , engineering
The energy intensive Haber–Bosch process could potentially be replaced by the electrocatalytic N 2 reduction reaction (NRR) to produce NH 3 if high‐efficiency electrocatalysts can be developed. This work reports an electrocatalytic N 2 reduction reaction to produce NH 3 using a core‐shell structure Au@CeO 2 electrocatalyst synthesized by a room‐temperature spontaneous redox approach using Ce 3+ and AuCl 4 −1 as reaction precursors. The experimental results and theoretical calculations validate that the abundant oxygen vacancies in shell layer CeO 2 nanoparticles are electrocatalytically active sites for the N 2 adsorption and activation, coupling with small‐sized Au nanoparticles in the core layer of Au@CeO 2 , synergistically enhancing its NRR performance. More information can be found in the Full Paper by M. Han, H. Zhang et al. on page 5904.