Aaron Marshall, Vladimir Golovko and Shailendra Kumar Sharma (University of Canterbury) affiliated with the MacDiarmid Institute for Advanced Materials and Nanotechnology
Electrochemical reduction of carbon dioxide (CO2) into high-value chemicals or fuels is a promising way to store renewable energy sources.
Although gold and silver are often used for the electrochemical conversion of CO2 to CO (CO2RR), they can be inefficient. The research team hypothesised that phosphine-capped Au clusters would lead to improved catalysis.
The team synthesised and compared CO2RR among a range of phosphine-capped gold clusters. They used the X-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS) beamline to characterize the local chemical environment, oxidation states, and coordination geometries of the Au clusters. This strategy addresses the synthesis challenges by providing a scalable method to create efficient and stable catalysts for CO2RR.
The development of catalysts with highly dispersed gold clusters has significant implications for the field of catalysis and environmental sustainability. The team’s results demonstrated that these catalysts exhibit high efficiency and selectivity for CO2RR.
This advance provides a viable solution for CO2 conversion and contributes to the broader effort to develop sustainable and green technologies.
Reference:
Sharma SK, Ahangari HT, Johannessen B, Golovko VB and Marshall AT. 2023. Au cluster-derived electrocatalysts for CO2 reduction. Electrocatalysis 14:611-623. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12678-023-00821-2
