Electrocatalysts and Reaction Mechanisms for Oxygen and CO₂ Reduction Reactions

Dear Colleagues,

Cathodic oxygen reduction in fuel cells is a multi-electron process with complicated intermediates such as sluggish chemical kinetics, which is a major barrier to large-scale fuel cell usage. According to the literature, doping and defect engineering can significantly increase catalyst materials' catalytic activity. The mechanism of doping and defect engineering produces more unsaturated sites in the catalyst material, which is beneficial to reaction molecule adsorption. Doping and defect engineering can also be used to adjust the electronic structure of the catalyst, promote the oxidative desorption of intermediate products, and accelerate the reaction.

Renewable energy enables the electrochemical CO₂ reduction reaction (CO2RR) production of economically value-added chemicals to achieve energy storage in the form of chemical bonds, this strategy can effectively alleviate the climate problems caused by carbon dioxide emissions. As a simple proton–electron transfer reaction process, efficient electrocatalysts can achieve large-reaction current density and maintain high CO or HCOOH selectivity (FEC1>90%). However, the market demand for long-chain hydrocarbons is higher, the multiple single-step reactions process produces a variety of reaction intermediates, the C²⁺ products are widely distributed, the cost of separating the target products is high, and the reaction mechanism is not clear.

The present Special Issue of electrocatalysis is dedicated to the development and implementation of high-efficiency catalysts. We welcome more researchers to use spectroscopy methods and higher resolution electron microscope technology to study the mechanisms of the oxygen and CO2RR reduction reaction path to guide the design of efficient and inexpensive catalysts, or to improve the reaction devices and simplify the production conditions for them, as well as ensure stable long-term operation under high current conditions.

Dr. Qiaoxia Li
Guest Editor

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