Issue

Vol. 15 (2023)

3D Interconnected Honeycomb-Like Multifunctional Catalyst for Zn–Air Batteries

https://doi.org/10.1007/s40820-022-00959-6
Tianxu Jin
State Key Laboratory of Chemical Resource Engineering, Beijing University of Chemical Technology, Beijing 100029, People’s Republic of China
Junli Nie
State Key Laboratory of Chemical Resource Engineering, Beijing University of Chemical Technology, Beijing 100029, People’s Republic of China
Mei Dong
State Key Laboratory of Chemical Resource Engineering, Beijing University of Chemical Technology, Beijing 100029, People’s Republic of China
Binling Chen
College of Engineering, Mathematics and Physical Science, University of Exeter, Exeter EX4 4QF, UK
Jun Nie
State Key Laboratory of Chemical Resource Engineering, Beijing University of Chemical Technology, Beijing 100029, People’s Republic of China
Guiping Ma
State Key Laboratory of Chemical Resource Engineering, Beijing University of Chemical Technology, Beijing 100029, People’s Republic of China

Corresponding Author: Guiping Ma

magp@mail.buct.edu.cn

Nano-Micro Letters, Vol. 15 (2023), Article Number: 26

Abstract

Developing high-performance and low-cost electrocatalysts is key to achieve the clean-energy target. Herein, a dual regulation method is proposed to prepare a 3D honeycomb-like carbon-based catalyst with stable Fe/Co co-dopants. Fe atoms are highly dispersed and fixed to the polymer microsphere, followed by a high-temperature decomposition, for the generation of carbon-based catalyst with a honeycomb-like structure. The as-prepared catalyst contains a large number of Fe/Co nanoparticles (Fe/Co NPs), providing the excellent catalytic activity and durability in oxygen reduction reaction, oxygen evolution reaction and hydrogen evolution reaction. The Zn-air battery assembled by the as-prepared catalyst as air cathode shows a good charge and discharge capacity, and it exhibits an ultra-long service life by maintaining a stable charge and discharge platform for a 311-h cycle. Further X-ray absorption fine structure characterization and density functional theory calculation confirms that the Fe doping optimizes the intermediate adsorption process and electron transfer of Co.


Highlights:


1 The unique initiator doping strategy is adopted to achieve high dispersion of Fe atoms in the catalyst.
2 The 3D interconnected structure manufactured by morphology control exhibited excellent electrocatalytic performance in speeding up the electrolytes streaming and electron transfer.
3 The Zn-air battery assembled with catalyst Fe8Co0.2-NC-800 could maintain a stable charge discharge platform in 1701 cycles of 311 h.

Keywords

Fe/Co nanoparticles Core–shell microspheres Multifunctional catalyst Stability
Jin, Tianxu, Junli Nie, Mei Dong, Binling Chen, Jun Nie, and Guiping Ma. 2022. “3D Interconnected Honeycomb-Like Multifunctional Catalyst for Zn–Air Batteries”. Nano-Micro Letters 15 (December):26. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40820-022-00959-6.
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