A Janus antimony sulfide catalyst for highly selective N electroreduction.

The antimony sulfide SbS is firstly explored as a Janus catalyst for highly selective nitrogen reduction reaction (NRR). The developed SbS nanoflowers delivered an excellent faradaic efficiency of 24.1% and a high NH yield of 33.4 μg h mg at -0.3 V. Theoretical calculations revealed that the high NRR selectivity of SbS originated from the Janus role of active Sb centers: on one hand, Sb exhibited a strong Sb5p-N2p hybridization upon initial N protonation, capable of effectively activating the NRR with a low reaction barrier. On the other hand, Sb could concurrently impede the hydrogen evolution by hindering the H adsorption.