Yu Qiu, Q. Shi, Liang-Liang Zhou
Mar 30, 2020
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0
Influential Citations
33
Citations
Journal
ACS applied materials & interfaces
Abstract
Catalytic decomposition of the hydrogen-rich hydrazine monohydrate (N2H4·H2O) represents a promising hydrogen stor-age/production technology. A rational design of advanced N2H4·H2O decomposition catalysts requires an overall consideration of intrinsic activity, number and accessibility of active sites. We herein report the synthesis of a hierarchically nanostructured NiPt/N-doped carbon catalyst using a three-step method that can simultaneously address these issues. The chelation of metal precursors with polydopamine and thermolysis of the resulting complexes under reductive atmosphere resulted in a concurrent formation of N-doped carbon substrate and catalytically active NiPt alloy nanoparticles. Thanks to the usage of silica nanosphere template and dopamine precursor, the N-doped carbon substrate possesses a hierarchical macroporous-mesoporous architecture. This, together with the uniform dispersion of tiny NiPt nanoparticles on the carbon substrate, offers opportunity for creating abundant and acces-sible active sites. Benefiting from these favorable attributes, the NiPt/N-doped carbon catalyst enables a complete and rapid hy-drogen production from alkaline N2H4·H2O solution with a rate of 1602 h-1 at 50 oC, which outperforms most existing catalysts for NN2H4·H2O decomposition.