One-step prepared prussian blue/porous carbon composite derives highly efficient Fe-N-C catalyst for oxygen reduction

Preparation of high-efficiency oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) catalysts with abundant and inexpensive biomass materials have been a hot research topic. We use nitrogen-rich lentinus edodes and potassium ferrate (K2FeO4) to simultaneously activate the carbon material and prepare prussian blue (PB), and a porous carbon composite (PB/C) containing PB is synthesized. Finally, using ammonium chloride (NH4Cl) as a nitrogen source to further synthesize a Fe-N-C catalyst (PB/CN1T800) containing a trace amount of Fe for ORR. Results show that the prepared PB/CN1T800 catalyst forms a coral-like structure, which mainly contains mesopores and possesses a large specific surface area of approximately 1582 m(2)g(-1) . Moreover, the onset potential of PB/CN1T800 is 0.95 V, and the half-wave potential is 0.83 V, which are consistent with those of commercial Pt/C. Thus the PB/CN1T800 material is an ORR catalyst with excellent performance. This work provides a basis for simple and efficient conversion of rich biomass into PB/porous carbon composites to prepare highly efficient catalysts. (C) 2020 Hydrogen Energy Publications LLC. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.