journal article·2025-10

High‐Entropy Effect of Mesoporous Metal Oxides Promotes Tandem Catalysis for Efficient Ammonia Electrosynthesis from Nitrate

Hangjuan He, Huiqin Yao, Lizhi Sun, Yuyang Yang, Zhen‐An Qiao, Ben Liu

Advanced Materials· Volume 37· Issue 41
Publisher page

Abstract

Abstract Electrocatalytic nitrate reduction reaction (NO3−RR) in water offers a sustainable alternative for robust electrosynthesis of value‐added ammonia (NH3) in ambient conditions. However, NO3−RR electrocatalysis generally involves two‐step tandem routes and suffers from sluggish hydrodeoxygenation kinetics, which result in a low ammonia selectivity and yield rate. In this work, it is demonstrated that the high‐entropy effect of mesoporous metal oxides remarkably decreases the energy barrier of the hydrodeoxygenation route and facilitates two‐step tandem electrocatalysis of NO3−RR, which thus promotes selective NH3 electrosynthesis in an alkaline condition. By comparing a series of high‐entropy mesoporous metal oxides and corresponding metal alloys and monometallic counterparts, high‐entropy mesoporous (CoMnFeNiCu)3O4 discloses the highest electrocatalytic performance for efficient NH3 electrosynthesis from NO3−RR, including remarkable NH3 Faradaic efficiency of 96.3%, high NH3 yield rate of 1.83 mmol h−1 mg−1, and excellent recycling stability of 20 cycles, representing one of the best electrocatalysts reported in the past three years. Moreover, cathode NO3−RR performance for selective NH3 electrosynthesis is enhanced when further coupled with the thermodynamically favorable benzyl alcohol oxidation reaction at the anode. It is expected that the high‐entropy effect opens up a new route to design a library of novel tandem mesoporous metal electrocatalysts for the selective electrosynthesis of various valuable chemicals from wastewater.
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Research context

OpenAlex topics: Ammonia Synthesis and Nitrogen Reduction · Advanced Photocatalysis Techniques · Nanomaterials for catalytic reactions

SciVX discovery tags are terminology-based. OpenAlex topics are source-provided classifications.

Affiliations

Key Laboratory of Green Chemistry and Technology of Ministry of Education College of Chemistry Sichuan University Chengdu 610064 China

School of Basic Medical Sciences Ningxia Medical University Yinchuan 750004 China

State Key Laboratory of Inorganic Synthesis and Preparative Chemistry College of Chemistry Jilin University Changchun 130012 China

Funding

National Key Research and Development Program of China · Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities · National Natural Science Foundation of China

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