Defect Engineering Metal-Free Polymeric Carbon Nitride Electrocatalyst for Effective Nitrogen Fixation under Ambient Conditions.

Electrocatalytic nitrogen reduction reaction (NRR) under ambient conditions provides an intriguing picture for the conversion of N into NH . However, electrocatalytic NRR mainly relies on metal-based catalysts, and it remains a grand challenge in enabling effective N activation on metal-free catalysts. Here we report a defect engineering strategy to realize effective NRR performance (NH yield: 8.09 μg h  mg , Faradaic efficiency: 11.59 %) on metal-free polymeric carbon nitride (PCN) catalyst. Illustrated by density functional theory calculations, dinitrogen molecule can be chemisorbed on as-engineered nitrogen vacancies of PCN through constructing a dinuclear end-on bound structure for spatial electron transfer. Furthermore, the N-N bond length of adsorbed N increases dramatically, which corresponds to "strong activation" system to reduce N into NH . This work also highlights the significance of defect engineering for improving electrocatalysts with weak N adsorption and activation ability.