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NATURE
[4] Chemistry: Efficient ‘clean’ conversion of CO2 to liquid fuel
A new electrocatalyst that can convert carbon dioxide (CO2) into liquid fuel is reported in
a paper published in Nature. The study finds that particular arrangements of cobalt and
cobalt oxide atoms transform the material from one that is considered not catalytically
active for CO2 conversion to one with greater catalytic activity than previously reported
metal or metal oxide catalysts.
CO2 can be converted into different chemical species using electricity and a catalyst in a
process called electroreduction. This process is a potentially ‘clean’ strategy for replacing
many of the fossil-fuel-based chemicals that supply industry, while simultaneously
making use of CO2 emissions and thus mitigating their adverse effects on climate.
However, activating CO2 for conversion into higher-value chemicals remains the critical
bottleneck in this process, typically requiring impractically large amounts of energy.
Recently, catalysts based on oxide-derived metal nanostructures (which contain metal
and oxygen atoms) have been shown to convert CO2 using small amounts of energy, but
the role of the oxide remains unclear.
Yongfu Sun and colleagues created four-atom-thick layers of either pure cobalt or mixed
cobalt and cobalt oxide (Co3O4) to be used as catalysts. They show that cobalt becomes
active when placed in the correct arrangement and oxidation state, and that the atomiclayer structure and the presence of the metal oxide improve catalytic activity beyond that
of metal or metal oxide catalysts previously evaluated under comparable conditions.
They suggest that this points to new opportunities for manipulating and improving metalbased CO2 electroreduction catalysts.
ARTICLE DETAILS
DOI: 10.1038/nature16455
Corresponding Author:
Yongfu Sun
University of Science & Technology of China, Anhui, China
Email: yfsun@ustc.edu.cn Tel: +86 551 63606379
Please link to the article in online versions of your report (the URL will go live after the embargo ends):
http://nature.com/articles/doi:10.1038/nature16455