Title: Construction of Highly Active Metal‐Containing Nanoparticles & FeCo‐N4 Composite Sites for Acid Oxygen Reduction Reaction

Authors: Shu-Hu Yin, Jian Yang, Yu Han, Gen Li, Li-Yang Wan, You-Hu Chen, Chi Chen, Xi-Ming Qu, Yan-Xia Jiang, Shi-Gang Sun

Abstract: Metal‐containing nanoparticles (M‐NPs) in metal/nitrogen‐doped carbon (M‐N‐C) catalysts have been considered hostile to acid oxygen reduction reaction (ORR). Some works have confirmed that M‐NPs can synergistically increase ORR activity in alkaline media. However, the relation between M‐NPs and the active sites of metal coordinated with nitrogen (MNx) is hard to be established in acid medium due to the poor stability of M‐NPs. Herein, we develop a strategy to successfully construct a new FeCo‐N‐C catalyst containing the highly active M‐NPs and MN4  composite sites (marked as M/FeCo‐SAs‐N‐C). The enhanced catalytic activity and stability of M/FeCo‐SAs‐N‐C is discovered in our systematic experiments. Moreover, theoretical calculation reveals that there is a strong interaction between M‐NPs and FeN4  sites, which can favor ORR by activating the O‐O bond, thus facilitating a direct 4e‐  process. Those findings firstly shed light on the highly active M‐NPs and FeN4  composite sites for catalyzing acid oxygen reduction reaction, and the relevant reaction mechanism is suggested.

Full-Link: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/anie.202010013