Boron/Nitrogen-Codoped Carbon Nano-Onion Electrocatalysts\nfor the Oxygen Reduction Reaction

Abstract

Herein,\nwe present the production of dual-atom (B and N)-codoped\ncarbon nano-onions (BN-CNOs) by a standard annealing method. The proposed\ncodoping approach is efficient to introduce both heteroatoms in the\ngraphitic skeleton, as revealed by several characterization techniques,\nand suitable for a low-cost mass production of C-based catalysts.\nThe activity of the CNO-based electrocatalysts toward oxygen reduction\nreaction has been investigated in alkaline media, showing comparable\ncatalytic performance, higher long-term stability (retaining 98.7%\nof the initial current over 3 h of testing), and excellent immunity\ntoward methanol crossover compared to the standard Pt/C-based catalysts.\nOur findings confirm that B/N-codoped CNOs are promising candidates\nto efficiently catalyze the oxygen reduction in energy devices.