Catalyst synthesis and characterizations. The cooperative catalyst of Au nanoparticles supported on CoOOH nanosheets (Au/CoOOH) was prepared via a two-step electrochemical method, in which Co(OH)2 was initially synthesized on nickel (Ni) foam, then Au nanoparticles were electrodeposited onto Co(OH)2. The as-prepared Au/Co(OH)2 was electro-oxidized in 1 M KOH solution to structurally transform to Au/CoOOH. For catalytic comparison, CoOOH nanosheets and Au nanoparticles on Ni foam were also synthesized following similar methods. Scanning electron microscope (SEM) images (Fig. 1a and Supplementary Fig. 1) show that the as-synthesized Au/CoOOH nanosheets (with an average thickness of ~10 nm and diameter of 200–300 nm) are vertically grown on Ni foam and form array structure. High-resolution transmission electron microscope (HRTEM) images reveal that Au nanoparticles are well dispersed on the CoOOH nanosheets (Fig. 1b and supplementary Fig. 2) with average diameter of 4.3 nm (Fig. 1c). The HRTEM image of an individual Au nanoparticle displays fringe distances of 0.203 nm (Fig. 1b; inset), closely matching the (200) plane of face-centered-cubic Au. X-ray diffraction (XRD) analysis of Au/Co(OH)2 and Au/CoOOH reveals a typical structure transformation from α-Co(OH)2 to γ-CoOOH phase because the (003) diffraction peak shifts from 10.1° to 12.9° (Fig. 1d and Supplementary Fig. 3)22,23, together with the sharp peaks from Ni foam substrate. The Au (111) reflection at 2θ = 38.2° for both Au/Co(OH)2 and Au/CoOOH is very weak due to the small size of Au nanoparticles. Inductively coupled plasma-atomic emission spectrometry (ICP-AES) confirms that the mass loading of Au on CoOOH was 11.3 wt% (Supplementary Table 1).
Benzyl alcohol electrooxidation. Electrochemical oxidation of benzyl alcohol was tested to evaluate the catalytic performance of Au/CoOOH. Au and CoOOH were used as the reference catalysts. Fig. 2a shows their linear sweep voltammetry (LSV) curves. The CoOOH exhibits an onset potential of ~1.48 V vs. RHE for water oxidation in 1 M KOH solution. After adding 0.1 M benzyl alcohol, the onset potential is reduced to ~1.28 V vs. RHE, in consistent with previous report24. Although the current density increases compared with OER process, it is still very low at moderate cell voltage (only 19 and 53 mA cm−2 at 1.3 and 1.4 V vs. RHE, respectively). As for Au catalyst, the current density starts to decay rapidly from ~1.35 V vs. RHE, which is due to Au deactivation as reported for noble metal catalysis25−28. Notably, by using Au/CoOOH as the catalyst, the onset potential shifts negatively to ~1.0 V vs. RHE with significant enhancement of current density compared with CoOOH (from 19 to 330 mA cm−2 at 1.3 V vs. RHE based on the LSV curves). The current density further reaches 439 and 523 mA cm−2 at moderate potential of 1.4 and 1.5 V vs. RHE, respectively. To the best of our knowledge, these current density values are the highest reported so far for electrocatalytic AORs (Fig. 2b and Supplementary Table 2)29−34.
Chronoamperometric (CA) measurement was then carried out. As shown in Fig. 2c, the current-time (I-t) curve of Au/CoOOH shows a high initial current density of ~330 mA cm−2 at 1.3 V vs. RHE in 1 M KOH with 0.1 M benzyl alcohol at r.t., much higher than that of CoOOH (with an initial current density of ~20 mA cm−2). Although the Au catalyst exhibits an initial current density of 152 mA cm−2, it decays rapidly to lower than 6 mA cm−2 within 600 s. In addition, the current densities are very weak in the absence of benzyl alcohol (Supplementary Fig. 4), indicating that the high current density over Au/CoOOH is caused by the oxidation of the benzyl alcohol, rather than the reduction of Co, OH− adsorption or other effects on the surface.
Fig. 2d shows the benzyl alcohol conversion rate (left column), space-time yield of H2 and Faradaic efficiency (FE) (right column) over different catalysts. The conversion rate for benzyl alcohol oxidation over Au/CoOOH reaches 3.19 mmol cm−2 h−1 (corresponding to 968 C cm−2 h−1) with FE of 99% at 1.3 V vs. RHE (Fig. 1e), which is 50 and 17-fold higher than that of CoOOH and Au, respectively. The kinetic curves for benzyl alcohol conversion as function of reaction time reveals its sequential oxidation to benzaldehyde and then to benzoic acid is involved (Supplementary Fig. 5). As for the H2 production at the counterpart Pt cathode, the space-time yield reaches 117.9 mL cm−2 h−1 when Au/CoOOH is used as the anode, significantly higher than CoOOH (2.2 mL cm−2 h−1) and Au (6.1 mL cm−2 h−1).
Mechanistic investigation of benzyl alcohol enrichment. To study the current density enhancement for benzyl alcohol electrooxidation over Au/CoOOH, in-situ Fourier transformed infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy was conducted to study the interaction between benzyl alcohol and the catalyst. Benzyl alcohol molecule in gas phase shows typical skeletal vibration of the benzene ring at 1455 cm−1, δ(O−H) at 1209 cm−1 and ν(C−O) at 1022 cm−1 (Supplementary Fig. 6) 35−37. When benzyl alcohol was adsorbed on CoOOH, the peak positions are close to gaseous benzyl alcohol, and it was easily removed by He purging within 15 min (Fig. 3a), indicating benzyl alcohol is weakly adsorbed on CoOOH38. As for benzyl alcohol adsorbed on Au/CoOOH, the band intensity that corresponds to skeletal vibration of the benzene ring (peak at 1455 cm−1) decreases considerably and widens towards lower wavenumber, together with the appearance of new bands at around 1435 and 1418 cm−1 (Fig. 3b). These variations may be attributed to the interaction between Au and benzene ring of benzyl alcohol that leads to the decrease of benzene symmetry, because breaking of symmetry was demonstrated to give rise to band shifting and splitting39. Moreover, the bands of δ(O−H) and ν(C−O) shift to lower wavenumbers and the intensity of δ(O−H) band is weakened due to the adsorption of benzyl alcohol40,41. New bands at 1125 cm−1 were observed, which are assigned to the stretching mode of C−O bond of alcoholate species adsorbed on the CoOOH42. Importantly, the signals of adsorbed benzyl alcohol maintained over 20 min of He purging, indicating a strong interaction exists between benzyl alcohol and Au/CoOOH.
To understand the enhanced adsorption of benzyl alcohol on Au/CoOOH, spin-polarized DFT calculations were carried out. Three models were constructed to represent CoOOH surface, Au surface and Au/CoOOH interface in Au/CoOOH, denoted as CoOOH, Au, and Au/CoOOH, respectively (Supplementary Fig. 7). The calculated adsorption energy of benzyl alcohol is much lower on Au/CoOOH (Fig. 3c), suggesting that the adsorption of benzyl alcohol on Au/CoOOH is thermodynamically more preferable. By analyzing the density of states and Hirshfeld charge of Au/CoOOH, together with the frontier orbitals of benzyl alcohol, it can be deduced that the electron in occupied Au 5d orbital can transfer to the unoccupied π* orbital of benzyl alcohol (Fig. 3d, Supplementary Fig. 8a and Supplementary Note 1)43. This d-π interaction endows Au/CoOOH with stronger adsorption ability to benzyl alcohol than CoOOH. Meanwhile, the interaction between hydroxyl group of benzyl alcohol and terminated-O on CoOOH via hydrogen bonding also contributes to the enhanced adsorption energy (Supplementary Fig. 8b).
To consider the enrichment of benzyl alcohol on Au/CoOOH in real reaction system, AIMD simulations were performed by positioning Au/CoOOH in a solvent box filled with water (the electrolyte in reaction) and four benzyl alcohol molecules (denoted as Au/CoOOH_sol). The adsorption of benzyl alcohols on CoOOH was also simulated under the same conditions for comparison (denoted as CoOOH_sol). As displayed in Fig. 3e and Supplementary video 1 and 2, after simulation time of 1000 ps, only one benzyl alcohol molecule was adsorbed on CoOOH, while the other three remained in the bulk solution. For Au/CoOOH_sol, all of the molecules approached to and then were enriched on Au/CoOOH surface within 200 ps (Fig. 3f). After total simulation time of 1000 ps, three of the molecules were finally adsorbed on Au/CoOOH interface, and another one on Au surface. During the adsorption process, the total energy of Au/CoOOH_sol decreased, while there was no obvious decrease for CoOOH_sol (Fig. 3g). These results suggest the possibility of Au/CoOOH for benzyl alcohol enrichment in real reaction system, and the interface between Au and CoOOH is the preferential adsorption site.
To understand the reaction mechanism of benzyl alcohol oxidation, Gibbs free energy diagrams of benzyl alcohol oxidation to benzoic acid were calculated over different catalysts (Fig. 4a; Supplementary Figs. 9-11, Table 3 and Note 2). The reaction begins with benzyl alcohol adsorption, then it is oxidized to benzaldehyde and finally to benzoic acid. For CoOOH and Au catalysts, the rate-determining step (RDS) is the benzaldehyde formation, with the reaction barrier of 1.45 and 1.34 eV, respectively. Due to the strong d-π interaction, the energy of adsorbed benzaldehyde (Ph-CHO*) is decreased on Au/CoOOH, thus lowering the Gibbs free energy barrier for the benzaldehyde formation step to 1.09 eV. The RDS over Au/CoOOH in turn switches to the generation of benzoic acid with lower reaction barrier (1.26 eV) compared with CoOOH and Au. To consider the real reaction system wherein more benzyl alcohol molecules may cover on the catalyst as indicated by AIMD results, the calculation of Gibbs free energy diagrams was investigated in the presence of five benzyl alcohol molecules adsorbed on the Au/CoOOH interface (see Supplementary Fig. 12). As shown in Fig. 4b, the resulting reaction barrier of RDS (benzyl alcohol to benzoic acid) is lower than the case of one molecule, indicating that benzyl alcohol oxidation is easier to proceed when more molecules are enriched on Au/CoOOH.
Substrate scoping. To demonstrate the general applicability of the alcohol enrichment over Au/CoOOH catalyst, benzyl alcohols with diverse substituents (−Cl, −F, −CH3, −CF3, −OCH3, −C(CH3)3) were examined. The electrooxidations were performed at 60 ºC to guarantee alcohols dissolution in 1 M KOH. The catalytic results show that the Au/CoOOH exhibits 2 to 16-fold enhancement of current density (representing as charge transfer) compared with CoOOH, together with higher production rates of alcohol-oxidized products (entries 1-6, Table 1; and Supplementary Fig. 13) and comparably high FE towards them. Among these alcohol molecules, benzyl alcohol substituted with −C(CH3)3 shows inferior activity (entry 6, Table 1), which may be due to the steric hindrance that inhibits benzene ring adsorption on Au/CoOOH. We further investigated the effect of phenyl and hydroxyl groups and their proximity on the current density. As shown in Supplementary Fig. 14, there is no current density enhancement for alcohols without phenyl group (ethanol and cyclohexanemethanol) or aromatics without hydroxyl group (toluene), suggesting the importance of hydroxyl and phenyl groups in benzyl alcohol for current density enhancement over Au/CoOOH. Moreover, we found that the Au/CoOOH shows very weak current density enhancement for alcohol without α-phenyl group (β-phenethyl alcohol; entry 7, Table 1), which is attributed to the relatively weak adsorption of β-phenethyl alcohol on Au/CoOOH demonstrated by DFT calculation (Supplementary Fig. 15).
To broaden the substrate scope, we explored the alcohols with α-C=C (methallyl alcohol) and α-C=O group (hydroxyacetone), because these groups contain π bond that resembles benzene ring. To our delight, Au/CoOOH catalyst exhibits higher current density and product yields for electrooxidation of these alcohols compared with CoOOH (entries 8 and 9, Table 1; and Supplementary Fig. 16). This can be explained by the calculated negative adsorption energies for their adsorption on Au/CoOOH, which is due to the strong interaction between α-C=C/-C=O groups and Au via Au(d)-π interaction (see Supplementary Fig. 17 and Supplementary Note 3). Furthermore, we found that the Au/CoOOH catalyst shows enhanced current density as well as higher product yields for electrooxidation of polyols with vicinal hydroxyl groups, including ethylene glycol, 1,2-propanediol and glycerol (entries 10-12, Table 1; and Supplementary Fig. 18), among which glycerol is an important biomass derivative produced in large amount in biodiesel production. The enhancement can be explained by the oxidation of -CH2−OH to -C=O under the reaction conditions16,17, which leads to a similar enrichment effect as in the case of alcohol with α-C=O group.
[Please see the supplementary files section to view table 1.]
Understanding of the decay and revival of current density. We found that the current density decays gradually during the electrooxidation of benzyl alcohol (Fig. 5a), indicating a deactivation process may be involved. However, the initial high current density can be restored after potential cut-off for approximately 100 s at open circuit. To unveil the underlying mechanism for the decay and revival of current density, operando extended X-ray absorption fine structure spectroscopy was conducted (operando EXAFS). Fig. 5b shows the Au L3-edge XANES spectra of Au/CoOOH when anodic potential and open circuit were alternatively applied in 1 M KOH with 0.1 M benzyl alcohol. These operations are denoted as potential ON and OFF, respectively. When potential ON (1.4 V vs. RHE), the white line intensity enhances gradually (from line_a to line_d), which is assigned to Au oxidation possibly by the electrolyte, as verified by operando Au L3-edge XANES spectra (Supplementary Fig. 19). This process is accompanied by the gradual decay of current density, suggesting that Au oxidation may has a negative effect on alcohol enrichment. This was confirmed by pre-oxidizing Au/CoOOH prior to introducing benzyl alcohol into the electrolyte, which shows very low catalytic activity (Supplementary Fig. 20). Subsequently, potential OFF was exerted and it causes weakening of white line intensity (from line_d to line_f), indicating that Au is reduced at open circuit. It should be noted that Au cannot be reduced in 1 M KOH electrolyte alone (Supplementary Fig. 19), suggesting that Au is more likely reduced by benzyl alcohol. Indeed, alcohols can be used as reducing agent.44,45 This process is accompanied by rapid revival of current density, suggesting that the reduced Au can again adsorb and enrich benzyl alcohol molecules. The Au oxidation/reduction processes was demonstrated reversible when further anodic potential (from line_f to line_i) and open circuit (from line_i to line_k) were applied (Fig. 5b), suggesting that we could readily regain the high current density by exerting potential OFF. It should be mentioned that Co species in Au/CoOOH is oxidized more rapidly compared with current density decay (Supplementary Fig. 21), suggesting that Co oxidation may not be the main reason for the current decay.
To investigate the structure of Au species in Au/CoOOH when it is oxidized or reduced, Fourier-transform Au L3-edge EXAFS spectra was performed. As shown in Fig. 5c, the Au/CoOOH sample displays obvious Au−O bond in the R-space spectra under potential ON. Then, it is significantly weakened under potential OFF. This result indicates that the formation of Au-O(H) species under anodic potential could be the reason for the current decay, because Au-O(H) species can hinder the adsorption of benzyl alcohol on Au. We demonstrated the key role of Au in current density enhancement by using methionine as the poison reagent. As shown in Fig. 5d, the current density decays instantly when methionine was introduced to the electrolyte, which is attributed to the strong interaction between methionine and Au via Au-S bond that prevents benzyl alcohol from adsorption. The above results indicate that when Au gradually gets oxidized to form Au-O(H) species at anodic potential with attenuation of alcohol enrichment, it can reversibly undergo reduction at open circuit with revival of the enrichment ability (Fig. 5e).
Intermittent potential strategy. In light of the findings that the alcohol enrichment could be reversible, we sought to develop an intermittent potential (IP) strategy to maintain the high current density in long-term electrooxidation of benzyl alcohol over Au/CoOOH, via alternatively switching between anodic potential (potential ON) and open circuit (potential OFF). Specifically, the reaction was initially conducted at 1.35 V vs. RHE in 1 M KOH with 0.1 M benzyl alcohol to get high current density (~400 mA cm−2). When the current density decays to <250 mA cm−2, we cut off the potential for about 100 s to regain the benzyl alcohol enrichment. Then we switched the potential back to 1.35 V vs. RHE with the recovery of initial high current density. By repeating the above operations, the current density can be maintained at high level (250-400 mA cm−2) over 24 h (Fig. 6a). In contrast, the current density of Au/CoOOH decays from 400 to 60 mA cm−2 within 2 h using traditional constant potential (CP) strategy. As a result, the Au/CoOOH with IP strategy exhibits larger benzyl alcohol consumption, higher productivities of benzaldehyde, benzoic acid and H2, and comparably high FE of total anodic products (Fig. 6b). The Au/CoOOH maintains its original structure after the reaction (Supplementary Fig. 22), demonstrating its stability. The electric energy consumption using IP and CP strategies were also compared. The Au/CoOOH with the IP strategy requires much lower potential to reach the same current density (Fig. 6c), together with 33-43 % energy saving (Fig. 6d).