1
|
Saha D, Yu HJ, Wang J, Prateek, Chen X, Tang C, Senger C, Pagaduan JN, Katsumata R, Carter KR, Zhou G, Bai P, Wu N, Watkins JJ. Mesoporous Single Atom-Cluster Fe-N/C Oxygen Evolution Electrocatalysts Synthesized with Bottlebrush Block Copolymer-Templated Rapid Thermal Annealing. ACS Appl Mater Interfaces 2024; 16:13729-13744. [PMID: 38457643 DOI: 10.1021/acsami.3c18693] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 03/10/2024]
Abstract
Current electrocatalysts for oxygen evolution reaction (OER) are either expensive (such as IrO2, RuO2) or/and exhibit high overpotential as well as sluggish kinetics. This article reports mesoporous earth-abundant iron (Fe)-nitrogen (N) doped carbon electrocatalysts with iron clusters and closely surrounding Fe-N4 active sites. Unique to this work is that the mechanically stable mesoporous carbon-matrix structure (79 nm in pore size) with well-dispersed nitrogen-coordinated Fe single atom-cluster is synthesized via rapid thermal annealing (RTA) within only minutes using a self-assembled bottlebrush block copolymer (BBCP) melamine-formaldehyde resin composite template. The resulting porous structure and domain size can be tuned with the degree of polymerization of the BBCP backbone, which increases the electrochemically active surface area and improves electron transfer and mass transport for an effective OER process. The optimized electrocatalyst shows a required potential of 1.48 V (versus RHE) to obtain the current density of 10 mA/cm2 in 1 M KOH aqueous electrolyte and a small Tafel slope of 55 mV/decade at a given overpotential of 250 mV, which is significantly lower than recently reported earth-abundant electrocatalysts. Importantly, the Fe single-atom nitrogen coordination environment facilitates the surface reconstruction into a highly active oxyhydroxide under OER conditions, as revealed by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and in situ Raman spectroscopy, while the atomic clusters boost the single atoms reactive sites to prevent demetalation during the OER process. Density functional theory (DFT) calculations support that the iron nitrogen environment and reconstructed oxyhydroxides are electrocatalytically active sites as the kinetics barrier is largely reduced. This work has opened a new avenue for simple, rapid synthesis of inexpensive, earth-abundant, tailorable, mechanically stable, mesoporous carbon-coordinated single-atom electrocatalysts that can be used for renewable energy production.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Dipankar Saha
- Conte Center for Polymer Research, Department of Polymer Science and Engineering, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Amherst, Massachusetts 01003, United States
| | - Hsin-Jung Yu
- Conte Center for Polymer Research, Department of Polymer Science and Engineering, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Amherst, Massachusetts 01003, United States
| | - Jiacheng Wang
- Department of Chemical Engineering, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Amherst, Massachusetts 01003, United States
| | - Prateek
- Conte Center for Polymer Research, Department of Polymer Science and Engineering, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Amherst, Massachusetts 01003, United States
| | - Xiaobo Chen
- Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Binghamton University, State University of New York at Binghamton, Binghamton, New York 13850, United States
| | - Chaoyun Tang
- Department of Chemical Engineering, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Amherst, Massachusetts 01003, United States
| | - Claire Senger
- Conte Center for Polymer Research, Department of Polymer Science and Engineering, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Amherst, Massachusetts 01003, United States
| | - James Nicolas Pagaduan
- Conte Center for Polymer Research, Department of Polymer Science and Engineering, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Amherst, Massachusetts 01003, United States
| | - Reika Katsumata
- Conte Center for Polymer Research, Department of Polymer Science and Engineering, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Amherst, Massachusetts 01003, United States
| | - Kenneth R Carter
- Conte Center for Polymer Research, Department of Polymer Science and Engineering, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Amherst, Massachusetts 01003, United States
| | - Guangwen Zhou
- Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Binghamton University, State University of New York at Binghamton, Binghamton, New York 13850, United States
| | - Peng Bai
- Department of Chemical Engineering, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Amherst, Massachusetts 01003, United States
| | - Nianqiang Wu
- Department of Chemical Engineering, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Amherst, Massachusetts 01003, United States
| | - James J Watkins
- Conte Center for Polymer Research, Department of Polymer Science and Engineering, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Amherst, Massachusetts 01003, United States
| |
Collapse
|
2
|
Jeon S, Kamble YL, Kang H, Shi J, Wade MA, Patel BB, Pan T, Rogers SA, Sing CE, Guironnet D, Diao Y. Direct-ink-write cross-linkable bottlebrush block copolymers for on-the-fly control of structural color. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 2024; 121:e2313617121. [PMID: 38377215 PMCID: PMC10907314 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2313617121] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/08/2023] [Accepted: 01/16/2024] [Indexed: 02/22/2024] Open
Abstract
Additive manufacturing capable of controlling and dynamically modulating structures down to the nanoscopic scale remains challenging. By marrying additive manufacturing with self-assembly, we develop a UV (ultra-violet)-assisted direct ink write approach for on-the-fly modulation of structural color by programming the assembly kinetics through photo-cross-linking. We design a photo-cross-linkable bottlebrush block copolymer solution as a printing ink that exhibits vibrant structural color (i.e., photonic properties) due to the nanoscopic lamellar structures formed post extrusion. By dynamically modulating UV-light irradiance during printing, we can program the color of the printed material to access a broad spectrum of visible light with a single ink while also creating color gradients not previously possible. We unveil the mechanism of this approach using a combination of coarse-grained simulations, rheological measurements, and structural characterizations. Central to the assembly mechanism is the matching of the cross-linking timescale with the assembly timescale, which leads to kinetic trapping of the assembly process that evolves structural color from blue to red driven by solvent evaporation. This strategy of integrating cross-linking chemistry and out-of-equilibrium processing opens an avenue for spatiotemporal control of self-assembled nanostructures during additive manufacturing.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Sanghyun Jeon
- Department Materials Science and Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL61801
| | - Yash Laxman Kamble
- Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL61801
| | - Haisu Kang
- Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL61801
| | - Jiachun Shi
- Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL61801
| | - Matthew A. Wade
- Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL61801
| | - Bijal B. Patel
- Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL61801
| | - Tianyuan Pan
- Department Materials Science and Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL61801
- Department of Molecular Science and Engineering, Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL61801
| | - Simon A. Rogers
- Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL61801
- Department of Molecular Science and Engineering, Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL61801
| | - Charles E. Sing
- Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL61801
- Department of Molecular Science and Engineering, Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL61801
| | - Damien Guironnet
- Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL61801
- Department of Molecular Science and Engineering, Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL61801
- Department of Chemistry, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL61801
| | - Ying Diao
- Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL61801
- Department of Molecular Science and Engineering, Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL61801
| |
Collapse
|
3
|
Ahmed E, Cho J, Jang SS, Weck M. Nonorthogonal Cascade Catalysis in Multicompartment Micelles. Chemistry 2023; 29:e202301231. [PMID: 37183699 DOI: 10.1002/chem.202301231] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/19/2023] [Revised: 05/11/2023] [Accepted: 05/11/2023] [Indexed: 05/16/2023]
Abstract
Multicompartment micelles (MCMs) containing acid and base sites in discrete domains are prepared from poly(norbornene)-based amphiphilic bottlebrush copolymers in aqueous media. The acid and base sites are localized in different compartments of the micelle, enabling the nonorthogonal reaction sequence: deacetalization - Knoevenagel condensation - Michael addition of acetals to 2-amino chromene derivatives. Computational simulations using dissipative particle dynamics (DPD) elucidated the bottlebrush composition required to effectively site-isolate the nonorthogonal catalysts. This contribution presents MCMs as a new class of nanostructures for one-pot multistep nonorthogonal cascade catalysis, laying the groundwork for the isolation of three or more incompatible catalysts to synthesize value-added compounds in a single reaction vessel, in water.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Eman Ahmed
- Molecular Design Institute, Department of Chemistry, New York University, 100 Washington Square East, New York, NY, 10003, USA
| | - Jinwon Cho
- School of Materials Science and Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, 771 Ferst Dr., Atlanta, GA, 30332-0245, USA
| | - Seung Soon Jang
- School of Materials Science and Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, 771 Ferst Dr., Atlanta, GA, 30332-0245, USA
| | - Marcus Weck
- Molecular Design Institute, Department of Chemistry, New York University, 100 Washington Square East, New York, NY, 10003, USA
| |
Collapse
|
4
|
Ji E, Cummins C, Fleury G. Precise Synthesis and Thin Film Self-Assembly of PLLA- b-PS Bottlebrush Block Copolymers. Molecules 2021; 26:1412. [PMID: 33807816 PMCID: PMC7961899 DOI: 10.3390/molecules26051412] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/16/2021] [Revised: 02/26/2021] [Accepted: 03/03/2021] [Indexed: 11/16/2022] Open
Abstract
The ability of bottlebrush block copolymers (BBCPs) to self-assemble into ordered large periodic structures could greatly expand the scope of photonic and membrane technologies. In this paper, we describe a two-step synthesis of poly(l-lactide)-b-polystyrene (PLLA-b-PS) BBCPs and their rapid thin-film self-assembly. PLLA chains were grown from exo-5-norbornene-2-methanol via ring-opening polymerization (ROP) of l-lactide to produce norbornene-terminated PLLA. Norbonene-terminated PS was prepared using anionic polymerization followed by a termination reaction with exo-5-norbornene-2-carbonyl chloride. PLLA-b-PS BBCPs were prepared from these two norbornenyl macromonomers by a one-pot sequential ring opening metathesis polymerization (ROMP). PLLA-b-PS BBCPs thin-films exhibited cylindrical and lamellar morphologies depending on the relative block volume fractions, with domain sizes of 46-58 nm and periodicities of 70-102 nm. Additionally, nanoporous templates were produced by the selective etching of PLLA blocks from ordered structures. The findings described in this work provide further insight into the controlled synthesis of BBCPs leading to various possible morphologies for applications requiring large periodicities. Moreover, the rapid thin film patterning strategy demonstrated (>5 min) highlights the advantages of using PLLA-b-PS BBCP materials beyond their linear BCP analogues in terms of both dimensions achievable and reduced processing time.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
| | | | - Guillaume Fleury
- Laboratoire de Chimie des Polymères Organiques, Université de Bordeaux, CNRS, Bordeaux INP, LCPO, UMR 5629, F-33600 Pessac, France; (E.J.); (C.C.)
| |
Collapse
|