Cobalt Single Atoms Enhance Ethanol Electrooxidation on Pt/CeO2.

The commercialization of direct ethanol fuel cells (DEFCs) requires the development of electrocatalysts with high activity, high durability, and robust resistance to CO poisoning in the ethanol oxidation reaction (EOR), but there is still a significant challenge to overcome. In this work, we modulated the electronic structure of Pt by incorporating Co,N-co-doped porous carbon (CoNPC) and nanostructured CeO2 (nCeO2) to construct an enhanced catalyst (Pt/nCeO2@CoNPC) for EOR. The CoNPC with Co single atoms not only provides high electrical conductivity and abundant anchoring sites but also participates in electronic modulation. The synergistic electronic effect induced by Co single atoms and nCeO2 modulates the electronic environment of Pt, thereby tuning its binding affinity toward critical reaction intermediates of EOR. Furthermore, the presence of nCeO2 promotes the oxidative removal of CO* species through providing abundant OH* and inducing interfacial electronic effect. As a result, Pt/nCeO2@CoNPC shows strong resistance to CO poisoning, preserves 73% of its original performance following 500 cycles, and presents a remarkable mass activity (1591 mA mgPt -1).