Inside Back Cover: Deciphering and Suppressing Over‐Oxidized Nitrogen in Nickel‐Catalyzed Urea Electrolysis (Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 51/2021)

Abstract

Over‐oxidation in alkaline urea oxidation to dominate NO2− formation over N2 has been discovered by Xuejing Yang, Yefei Li, Ming Gong, and co‐workers in their Research Article on page 26656. The identified nitrogen conversion network and reaction mechanism has important implications for sustainable chemistry and inspires new rationales for novel catalyst designs for the electrochemical urea oxidation into N2 products.

Multistep Dissolution of Lamellar Crystals Generates Superthin Amorphous Ni(OH)2 Catalyst for UOR

“…Among many anodic reactions, the electrochemical urea oxidation reaction (UOR) shows a favorable prospect of energy‐related applications because of its low thermodynamic potential (0.37 V). [ 2b,3 ] Moreover, urea containing wastewater from industrial and agriculture can be treated simultaneously through UOR. [ 4 ]…”

“…UOR is a complicated six‐electron‐transfer process (CO(NH 2 ) 2 + 6OH − → N 2 + 5H 2 O + CO 2 + 6e − ) and the reaction kinetics is also slow, which requires high‐performance electrocatalysts with good stability to boost the UOR efficiency. [ 3a,4 ] Noble metal based catalysts, such as Ti‐Pt and Ru‐TiO 2 were used initially to achieve high activity for UOR, but the high cost and limited resource impede further industrial applications. [ 3b ] Therefore, considerable attention has been devoted to first‐row transition metal Ni‐based compounds as substitute for noble metal‐based catalysts due to their low cost and high intrinsic catalytic activity for UOR.…”

“…[ 3a,4 ] Noble metal based catalysts, such as Ti‐Pt and Ru‐TiO 2 were used initially to achieve high activity for UOR, but the high cost and limited resource impede further industrial applications. [ 3b ] Therefore, considerable attention has been devoted to first‐row transition metal Ni‐based compounds as substitute for noble metal‐based catalysts due to their low cost and high intrinsic catalytic activity for UOR. [ 3b,4,5 ]…”

“…[ 3b ] Therefore, considerable attention has been devoted to first‐row transition metal Ni‐based compounds as substitute for noble metal‐based catalysts due to their low cost and high intrinsic catalytic activity for UOR. [ 3b,4,5 ]…”

Palladium-Catalyzed Intermolecular Carbonylation-Based Difunctionalization of Alkenes

“…25 On the basis of previous reactions, we examined the palladium-catalyzed intermolecular arylcarbonylation of alkenes using unsymmetrical diaryliodonium salts (DAIS) as arylation reagents (Scheme 14 ). 26 Arylcarbonylation product 26a was obtained in 40% yield, accompanied by several side products, such as isomerization product 27 (in 25% yield), Heck-type product 28 (in 5% yield), and a dicarbonylation product 29 . Interestingly, the bulky aryl group Ar L is exclusively introduced into the products in this reaction, which is opposite to previous reports.…”