Regulations of active moiety in single atom catalysts for electrochemical hydrogen evolution reaction

Abstract

Hydrogen production from water splitting using renewable electric energy is an interesting topic towards the carbon neutral future. Single atom catalysts (SACs) have emerged as a new frontier in the field of catalysis such as hydrogen evolution reaction (HER), owing to their intriguing properties like high activity and excellent chemical selectivity. The catalytic active moiety is often comprised of a single metal atom and its neighboring environment from the supports. Recent published reviews about electricdriven HER tend to classify these SACs by the species of active center atom, nevertheless the influence of their neighboring coordinated atoms from the supports is somehow neglected. Thus we classify the SACs for HER through the type of supports, highlighting the electronic metal-support interaction and their coordination environment from support. Then, we put forward some structural designing strategies including regulating of the central atoms, coordination environments, and metal-support interactions. Finally, the current challenges and future research perspectives of SACs for HER are briefly proposed.

Competitive Coordination‐Pairing between Ru Clusters and Single‐Atoms for Efficient Hydrogen Evolution Reaction in Alkaline Seawater

“…[4,5] Evidently, single atom catalysts (SACs) are highly preferred for HER catalysis. [6,7] However, SACs tend to aggregate due to inherent high surface energy, thereby losing their unique structural properties as well as promising catalytic performance. [8,9] Thus, selecting suitable supports to stabilize the SACs with maximum metal utilization efficiency is critical for large-scale applications.…”

Superior Electrocatalyst for All‐pH Hydrogen Evolution Reaction: Heterogeneous Rh/N and S Co‐Doped Carbon Yolk–Shell Nanospheres

“…Combining the previous experimental results and theoretically calculated ΔG H values, Rh-based nanomaterials may serve as a promising candidate for pH-universal HER electrocatalysts. [12,13] For example, Guo and his team reported the successful preparation of monodisperse Rh 2 P nanoparticles by the colloidal method, in which the nanoparticles showed excellent HER performance in a wide pH range. [14] In addition, Du et al used the laser ablation method to synthesize compressed RhO 2 clusters embedded in Rh nanoparticles; the impressive performance indicated that Rh-based noble metals are superior for alkaline HER.…”

P and Cu Dual Sites on Graphitic Carbon Nitride for Photocatalytic CO2 Reduction to Hydrocarbon Fuels with High C2H6 Evolution

“…The dicoordinated N atoms in tri‐s‐triazine motifs substituted by the O atoms lead to enhance the separation efficiency of photo‐generated charge carriers of CN and then promote the reaction [4a] . Recently, single‐atom catalysts have become a hot topic in the field of materials due to their abundant and well‐defined atomic sites for tuning the electronic structure of catalysts [4b–o] . The combination of single‐atom with semiconductor (e.g., CN) offers new opportunities to solve long‐term problems in the field of photocatalysis [4g–j] .…”