Intermetallic Single-Atom Alloy In-Pd Bimetallene for Neutral Electrosynthesis of Ammonia from Nitrate

Minghao Xie; Sishuang Tang; Zhao Li; Maoyu Wang; Zhaoyu Jin; Panpan Li; Xun Zhan; Hua Zhou; Guihua Yu

doi:10.1021/jacs.3c03432

Intermetallic Single-Atom Alloy In-Pd Bimetallene for Neutral Electrosynthesis of Ammonia from Nitrate

J Am Chem Soc. 2023 Jun 28;145(25):13957-13967. doi: 10.1021/jacs.3c03432. Epub 2023 Jun 19.

Authors

Minghao Xie¹, Sishuang Tang¹, Zhao Li¹, Maoyu Wang², Zhaoyu Jin³, Panpan Li⁴, Xun Zhan¹, Hua Zhou², Guihua Yu¹

Affiliations

¹ Materials Science and Engineering Program and Walker Department of Mechanical Engineering, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas 78712, United States.
² X-ray Science Division, Advanced Photon Source, Argonne National Laboratory, Lemont, Illinois 60439, United States.
³ Institute of Fundamental and Frontier Sciences, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu 610054, P. R. China.
⁴ College of Materials Science and Engineering, Sichuan University, Chengdu 610065, P. R. China.

PMID: 37335563
DOI: 10.1021/jacs.3c03432

Abstract

Harvesting recyclable ammonia (NH₃) from the electrocatalytic reduction of nitrate (NO₃RR) offers a sustainable strategy to close the ecological nitrogen cycle from nitration contamination in an energy-efficient and environmentally friendly manner. The emerging intermetallic single-atom alloys (ISAAs) are recognized to achieve the highest site density of single atoms by isolating contiguous metal atoms into single sites stabilized by another metal within the intermetallic structure, which holds promise to couple the catalytic benefits from intermetallic nanocrystals and single-atom catalysts for promoting NO₃RR. Herein, ISAA In-Pd bimetallene, in which the Pd single atoms are isolated by surrounding In atoms, is reported to boost neutral NO₃RR with a NH₃ Faradaic efficiency (FE) of 87.2%, a yield rate of 28.06 mg h^-1 mg_Pd^-1, and an exceptional electrocatalytic stability with increased activity/selectivity over 100 h and 20 cycles. The ISAA structure induces substantially diminished overlap of Pd d-orbitals and narrowed p-d hybridization of In-p and Pd-d states around the Fermi level, resulting in a stronger NO₃^- adsorption and a depressed energy barrier of the potential-determining step for NO₃RR. Further integrating the NO₃RR catalyst into a Zn-NO₃^- flow battery as the cathode delivers a power density of 12.64 mW cm^-2 and a FE of 93.4% for NH₃ production.