Li Baoying, Zhang Yihe, Du Ruifeng, Liu Lei, Yu Xuelian
Beijing Key Laboratory of Materials Utilization of Nonmetallic Minerals and Solid Wastes, National Laboratory of Mineral Materials, School of Materials Science and Technology, China University of Geosciences, 100083, Beijing, People's Republic of China.
Nanotechnology. 2018 Mar 9;29(10):105401. doi: 10.1088/1361-6528/aaa688.
The electrochemical oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) has received great attention due to its importance in fuel cells and metal-air batteries. Here, we present a simple approach to prepare non-noble metal catalyst-CoO nanocrystals (NCs). The particle size and shape were simply controlled by different types and concentrations of metal precursor. Furthermore, different sizes and shapes of CoO NCs are explored as electrocatalysts for ORR, and it has been observed that particles with a similar shape, and smaller particle size led to greater catalytic current densities because of the greater surface area. For particles with a comparable size, the shape or crystalline structure governed the activity of the electrocatalytic reactions. Most importantly, the 9 nm-CoO were demonstrated to act as low-cost catalysts for the ORR with a similar performance to that of Pt catalysts.
电化学氧还原反应（ORR）因其在燃料电池和金属空气电池中的重要性而备受关注。在此，我们提出了一种制备非贵金属催化剂——氧化钴纳米晶体（NCs）的简单方法。通过不同类型和浓度的金属前驱体可以简单地控制颗粒尺寸和形状。此外，还探索了不同尺寸和形状的氧化钴纳米晶体作为ORR的电催化剂，并且观察到，由于具有更大的表面积，形状相似且粒径较小的颗粒会产生更大的催化电流密度。对于尺寸相当的颗粒，形状或晶体结构决定了电催化反应的活性。最重要的是，已证明9纳米的氧化钴可作为ORR的低成本催化剂，其性能与铂催化剂相似。
