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Carbon nanotubes supported oxygen reduction reaction catalysts: role of inner tubes

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Abstract

Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) have been widely investigated to develop efficient ORR catalysts. Here we demonstrate that CNTs with 2–7 inner tubes are better supports to develop highly efficient ORR catalysts. Macrocyclic compounds and metal particle loading can dramatically improve the activity for ORR, and the CNTs composed of 2–7 inner tubes functionalized with cobalt phthalocyanine (CoPc) or supported with Pt nanoparticles (NPs) universally demonstrated better activity for ORR, demonstrating that CNTs composed of between 2 and 7 concentric tubes were proved the best supports to develop CNT hybrids for ORR in alkaline condition. The new discovery provides guidance to develop highly efficient catalysts by selecting carbon nanotubes as supports.

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The average OD was abtain from the statistical data according to the TEM micrographs.

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Funding

This work was supported by the Key R&D project of Hubei Province, China (2021AAA006), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (51976143) and the Guangdong Key Areas Research and Development Program (2020B090904001 and 2019B090909003).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of Advanced Technology for Materials Synthesis and Processing, Wuhan University of Technology, Wuhan, 430070, China

    Tian Tian & Haolin Tang

  2. Hunan Provincial Key Laboratory of Nonferrous Value-Added Metallurgy, Central South University, Changsha, 410083, China

    Yi Cheng

  3. Key Laboratory of Medicinal and Edible Plants Resources of Hainan Province, Hainan Vocational University of Science and Technology, Haikou, 571126, People’s Republic of China

    Zhenfan Sun

  4. State Key Laboratory of Information Photonics and Optical Communications & School of Science, Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications, 100876, Beijing, China

    Kai Huang & Ming Lei

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  1. Tian Tian
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Tian Tian and Yi Cheng wrote the main manuscript text, Zhenfan Sun and Kai Huang prepared figures 1-8, Ming Lei and Haolin Tang edited the manuscript. All authors reviewed the manuscript."

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Correspondence to Ming Lei or Haolin Tang.

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Tian, T., Cheng, Y., Sun, Z. et al. Carbon nanotubes supported oxygen reduction reaction catalysts: role of inner tubes. Adv Compos Hybrid Mater 6, 7 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s42114-022-00592-2

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