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Updated: Apr 18, 2026

Synthesis and Performance Characterizations of Transition Metal Single Atom Catalyst for Electrochemical CO2 Reduction
Published on: April 10, 2018
Tuning Amorphous Surface Microenvironments for Accelerated *OH Adsorption toward Efficient CO2 Electrocatalysis
Zejiang Huang1, Jianming Gu2, Hang Zhou1
1Physics Department & Shanghai Key Laboratory of Magnetic Resonance, School of Physics, Institute of Magnetic Resonance and Molecular Imaging in Medicine, East China Normal University, North Zhongshan Road 3663, Shanghai 200062, P. R. China.
Abstract:
The catalyst surface microenvironment, particularly *OH adsorption, plays a decisive role in CO2 electroreduction. Precise engineering of amorphous surface microenvironments enables efficient *OH adsorption. While Cu-based catalysts show promise for the CO2 reduction reaction (CO2RR), controlling atomic-scale surface configurations remains challenging. Herein, we construct amorphous CuSnOx (a-CuSnOx) with tailored surface microenvironments through strategic Cu-Sn integration, achieving >90% formate Faradaic efficiency across broad current densities. Unlike its crystalline counterparts, the amorphous structure provides a high density of undercoordinated Cu and Sn sites, which collectively promote the adsorption of *OH, verified by the 17O NMR experiments. Operando 1H and 17O NMR analysis reveals that *OH directly involves formate production via a water-assisted mechanism. This *OH adsorption-dominated microenvironment directly facilitates formate generation, establishing a new design strategy for high-performance CO2RR catalysts and deepening the fundamental understanding of structure-activity relationships.
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