Tandem Dual-Site PbCu Electrocatalyst for High-Rate and Selective Glycine Synthesis at Industrial Current Densities

Li Li; Chaofan Wan; Shumin Wang; Xiaodong Li; Yongfu Sun; Yi Xie

doi:10.1021/acs.nanolett.3c05064

Tandem Dual-Site PbCu Electrocatalyst for High-Rate and Selective Glycine Synthesis at Industrial Current Densities

Nano Lett. 2024 Feb 21;24(7):2392-2399. doi: 10.1021/acs.nanolett.3c05064. Epub 2024 Feb 9.

Authors

Li Li¹, Chaofan Wan¹, Shumin Wang¹, Xiaodong Li², Yongfu Sun¹, Yi Xie¹

Affiliations

¹ Hefei National Research Center for Physical Sciences at Microscale, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230026, China.
² Max Planck Institute of Microstructure Physics, Weinberg 2, Halle 06120, Germany.

PMID: 38334492
DOI: 10.1021/acs.nanolett.3c05064

Abstract

Direct electrosynthesis of high-value amino acids from carbon and nitrogen monomers remains a challenge. Here, we design a tandem dual-site PbCu electrocatalyst for efficient amino acid electrosynthesis. Using oxalic acid (H₂C₂O₄) and hydroxylamine (NH₂OH) as the raw reactants, for the first time, we have realized the flow-electrosynthesis of glycine at the industrial current density of 200 mA cm^-2 with Faradaic efficiency over 78%. In situ ATR-FTIR spectroscopy characterizations reveal a favorable tandem pathway on the dual-site catalyst. Specifically, the Pb site drives the highly selective electroreduction of H₂C₂O₄ to form glyoxylic acid, and the Cu site accelerates the fast hydrogenation of oxime to form a glycine product. A glycine electrosynthesis (GES)-formaldehyde electrooxidation (FOR) assembly is further established, which synthesizes more valuable chemicals (HCOOH, H₂) while minimizing energy consumption. Altogether, we introduce a new strategy to enable the one-step electrosynthesis of high-value amino acid from widely accessible monomers.

Keywords: amino acid; dual-site PbCu; industrial current density; tandem electrocatalyst.