Synthesis of an ordered porous carbon with the dual nitrogen-doped interfaces and its ORR catalysis performance

Both nitrogen-doping feature and pore structure are critical factors for developing nitrogen-doped carbons based catalysts with a high performance toward oxygen reduction reaction (ORR). Herein, a simple one-step CVD of acetylene and acetonitrile vapor method using silanized SBA-15 as a template has been developed to synthesize an ordered porous carbon (OPC) with dual nitrogen-doped interfaces. The optimized sample as prepared with the CVD of 4 h at 750 degrees C contains two types of ordered mesopores that one type is the ordered cylindrical pores inheriting from the pores of SBA-15 and has a pore width of 4.0 similar to 5.0 nm, the other type is the ordered quasi-hexagonal pores with a width of 3.0 similar to 4.0 nm produced by etching the pore walls of SBA-15. These two types of pores whose pore walls are built by the nitrogen doped carbon layers resulted by the CVD and thus it actually makes the dual nitrogen-doped interfaced OPC (DN-OPC). Meanwhile, DN-OPC contains a few of micropores and a large SSA of 1430 m(2)/g. This dual-ordered pores and dual nitrogen-doped interfaces cannot only facilitate mass transport but also utilize the active sites of DN-OPC for ORR. Therefore, as metal-free ORR catalyst, DN-OPC exhibits a good activity close to commercial Pt/C catalyst, and an excellent durability and methanol tolerance. (C) 2020 Chinese Chemical Society and Institute of Materia Medica, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Automated summary

The study successfully synthesized an ordered porous carbon material with dual nitrogen-doped interfaces using a simple CVD method, demonstrating excellent performance for oxygen reduction reaction.