Atomic Fe Dispersed Hierarchical Mesoporous Fe-N-C Nanostructures for an Efficient Oxygen Reduction Reaction

Due to the scarcity and high cost of precious metals, the hydrogen economy would ultimately rely on non-platinum-group-metal (non-PGM) catalysts. The non-PGM-catalyzed oxygen reduction reaction, which is the bottleneck for the application of hydrogen fuel cells, is challenging because of the limited activity and durability of non-PGM catalysts. A stabilized single-atom catalyst may be a possible solution to this issue. In this work, we employ a coordination-assisted polymerization assembly strategy to synthesize an atomic Fe and N co-doped ordered mesoporous carbon nanosphere (denoted as meso-Fe-N-C). The meso-Fe-N-C possesses a hierarchical structure with a high surface area of 494.7 m(2) g(-1) as well as a high dispersion of Fe (2.9 wt %) and abundant N (4.4 wt %). With these beneficial structural properties, the meso-Fe-N-C exhibits excellent activity and durability toward the oxygen reduction reaction, outperforming the state-of-the-art Pt/C electrocatalysts.

Automated summary

Due to the scarcity and high cost of precious metals, the hydrogen economy may rely on non-platinum-group-metal catalysts. A study found that a stabilized single-atom Fe and N co-doped ordered mesoporous carbon nanosphere catalyst exhibits excellent activity and durability, surpassing the current state-of-the-art Pt/C electrocatalysts.