Subnanometer high-entropy alloy nanowires enable remarkable hydrogen oxidation catalysis

Changhong Zhan; Yong Xu; Lingzheng Bu; Huaze Zhu; Yonggang Feng; Tang Yang; Ying Zhang; Zhiqing Yang; Bolong Huang; Qi Shao; Xiaoqing Huang

doi:10.1038/s41467-021-26425-2

Subnanometer high-entropy alloy nanowires enable remarkable hydrogen oxidation catalysis

Nat Commun. 2021 Oct 29;12(1):6261. doi: 10.1038/s41467-021-26425-2.

Authors

Changhong Zhan^#¹, Yong Xu^#², Lingzheng Bu³, Huaze Zhu⁴, Yonggang Feng⁵, Tang Yang¹, Ying Zhang¹, Zhiqing Yang⁴, Bolong Huang⁶, Qi Shao⁵, Xiaoqing Huang⁷

Affiliations

¹ State Key Laboratory of Physical Chemistry of Solid Surfaces, College of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Xiamen University, 361005, Xiamen, China.
² Guangzhou Key Laboratory of Low-Dimensional Materials and Energy Storage Devices, Collaborative Innovation Center of Advanced Energy Materials, School of Materials and Energy, Guangdong University of Technology, 510006, Guangzhou, China.
³ State Key Laboratory of Physical Chemistry of Solid Surfaces, College of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Xiamen University, 361005, Xiamen, China. lzbu@xmu.edu.cn.
⁴ Shenyang National Laboratory for Materials Science, Institute of Metal Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 110016, Shenyang, China.
⁵ College of Chemistry, Chemical Engineering and Materials Science, Soochow University, 215123, Suzhou, China.
⁶ Department of Applied Biology and Chemical Technology, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hung Hom, Kowloon, Hong Kong SAR, China. bhuang@polyu.edu.hk.
⁷ State Key Laboratory of Physical Chemistry of Solid Surfaces, College of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Xiamen University, 361005, Xiamen, China. hxq006@xmu.edu.cn.

^# Contributed equally.

Abstract

High-entropy alloys (HEAs) with unique physicochemical properties have attracted tremendous attention in many fields, yet the precise control on dimension and morphology at atomic level remains formidable challenges. Herein, we synthesize unique PtRuNiCoFeMo HEA subnanometer nanowires (SNWs) for alkaline hydrogen oxidation reaction (HOR). The mass and specific activities of HEA SNWs/C reach 6.75 A mg_Pt+Ru^-1 and 8.96 mA cm^-2, respectively, which are 2.8/2.6, 4.1/2.4, and 19.8/18.7 times higher than those of HEA NPs/C, commercial PtRu/C and Pt/C, respectively. It can even display enhanced resistance to CO poisoning during HOR in the presence of 1000 ppm CO. Density functional theory calculations reveal that the strong interactions between different metal sites in HEA SNWs can greatly regulate the binding strength of proton and hydroxyl, and therefore enhances the HOR activity. This work not only provides a viable synthetic route for the fabrication of Pt-based HEA subnano/nano materials, but also promotes the fundamental researches on catalysis and beyond.