Open AccessEngineering morphology and porosity of N,S‐doped carbons by ionothermal carbonisation for increased catalytic activity towards oxygen reduction reaction
Author(s) -
Chen Yimai,
Huo Shuhui,
Wang Hui
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
micro and nano letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.25
H-Index - 31
ISSN - 1750-0443
DOI - 10.1049/mnl.2017.0792
Subject(s) - catalysis , chemical engineering , microporous material , mesoporous material , carbon fibers , adsorption , porosity , materials science , oxygen , specific surface area , doping , desorption , salt (chemistry) , molten salt , inorganic chemistry , chemistry , organic chemistry , composite material , optoelectronics , composite number , engineering
A facile and one‐pot method using NaCl/KCl as a molten salt medium was developed to tune the porous structure of N,S‐doped carbon derived from biomass at high temperature. With increasing the NaCl/KCl amount, the structures of the obtained carbons revealed by scanning electron microscopy become more and more open. N 2 adsorption/desorption isotherm shows that the hierarchical porous structure could be efficiently tuned by adjusting the amount of NaCl/KCl salt mixture. Specific surface area (SSA) of as‐prepared N,S‐doped carbon could reach 1478.6 m 2 g −1 . The relative ratio of micropore/mesopore drops with the increased NaCl/KCl. When the obtained carbons are used as the catalysts for oxygen reduction reaction (ORR), high catalytic activities are obtained, which result from the porous structure and doping effect of N atoms. Meanwhile, a volcano trend of the electrochemical performance for as‐prepared carbons is also shown, which is a result of multiple factors possessing the opposite effect on ORR. Importantly, producing N,S‐doped carbon from egg white in NaCl/KCl molten salt medium could provide a promising approach to synthesise the opened N,S‐doped carbons with a controllably porous structure and large SSA based on biomass precursors.