Copper
(Cu) is a catalyst broadly used in industry for hydrogenation
of carbon dioxide, which has broad implications for environmental
sustainability. An accurate understanding of the degeneration behavior
of Cu catalysts under operando conditions is critical
for uncovering the failure mechanism of catalysts and designing novel
ones with optimized performance. Despite the widespread use of these
materials, their failure mechanisms are not well understood because
conventional characterization techniques lack the necessary time and
spatial resolution to capture these complex behaviors. In order to
overcome these challenges, we carried out transmission electron microscopy
(TEM) with a specialized in situ gas environmental
holder, which allows us to unravel the dynamic behavior of the Cu
nanowires (NWs) in operando. The failure process
of these nanoscale Cu catalysts under CO2 atmosphere were
tracked and further rationalized based on our numerical modeling using
phase-field methods.
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