N-doped carbon nanotubes supported CoSe nanoparticles: A highly efficient and stable catalyst for HO electrosynthesis in acidic media.

UNLABELLED

Electrocatalytic oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) provides an attractive alternative to anthraquinone process for HO synthesis. Rational design of earth-abundant electrocatalysts for HO synthesis via a two-electron ORR process in acids is attractive but still very challenging. In this work, we report that nitrogen-doped carbon nanotubes as a multi-functional support for CoSe nanoparticles not only keep CoSe nanoparticles well dispersed but alter the crystal structure, which in turn improves the overall catalytic behaviors and thereby renders high O-to-HO conversion efficiency. In 0.1 M HClO, such CoSe@NCNTs hybrid delivers a high HO selectivity of 93.2% and a large HO yield rate of 172 ppm·h with excellent durability up to 24 h. Moreover, CoSe@NCNTs performs effectively for organic dye degradation via electro-Fenton process.

ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL

Supplementary material (SEM images, EDX mapping images, XPS spectrum, XRD patterns, RRDE voltammogram, Tafel plots, cyclic voltammograms, UV-Vis spectra, and Tables S1) is available in the online version of this article at 10.1007/s12274-021-3474-0.