Optically selective catalyst design with minimized thermal emission for facilitating photothermal catalysis

Converting solar energy into fuels is pursued as an attractive route to reduce dependence on fossil fuel. In this context, photothermal catalysis is a very promising approach through converting photons into heat to drive catalytic reactions. There are mainly three key factors that govern the photothermal catalysis performance: maximized solar absorption, minimized thermal emission and excellent catalytic property of catalyst. However, the previous research has focused on improving solar absorption and catalytic performance of catalyst, largely neglected the optimization of thermal emission. Here, we demonstrate an optically selective catalyst based Ti<sub>3</sub>C<sub>2</sub>T<sub>x</sub> Janus design, that enables minimized thermal emission, maximized solar absorption and good catalytic activity simultaneously, thereby achieving excellent photothermal catalytic performance. When applied to Sabatier reaction and reverse water-gas shift (RWGS) as demonstrations, we obtain an approximately 300% increase in catalytic yield through reducing the thermal emission of catalyst by ~70% under the same irradiation intensity. It is worth noting that the CO<sub>2</sub> methanation yield reaches 3317.2 mmol g<sub>Ru</sub><sup>-1</sup> h<sup>-1</sup> at light power of 2 W cm<sup>-2</sup>, setting a performance record among catalysts without active supports. We expect that this design opens up a new pathway for the development of high-performance photothermal catalysts.

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Publication Details

Journal
Nature Communications
Published
2024-08-31
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-024-51896-4
Citations
50
Primary Topic
MXene and MAX Phase Materials
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
5.86

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article

Optically selective catalyst design with minimized thermal emission for facilitating photothermal catalysis

Siyun Ren, Xing Zhang, Wangxi Liu, Liping Ding et al.
50 citations
Nature Communications
MXene and MAX Phase Materials
5.86
article

Optically selective catalyst design with minimized thermal emission for facilitating photothermal catalysis

Siyun Ren, Xing Zhang, Wangxi Liu, Liping Ding, Zhexing Lin, Wenbo Zhai, Bin Zhu, Yi Yu, Zhaosheng Li, Zipeng Chen, Jianyong Feng, Yi Jiang, Zhenyu Wu, Wei Li, Feng Ding, Jinlei Li, Jia Zhu, Zhenhui Lin, Tianji Liu, Zhengwei Yang
article en
50 citations

Abstract

Converting solar energy into fuels is pursued as an attractive route to reduce dependence on fossil fuel. In this context, photothermal catalysis is a very promising approach through converting photons into heat to drive catalytic reactions. There are mainly three key factors that govern the photothermal catalysis performance: maximized solar absorption, minimized thermal emission and excellent catalytic property of catalyst. However, the previous research has focused on improving solar absorption and catalytic performance of catalyst, largely neglected the optimization of thermal emission. Here, we demonstrate an optically selective catalyst based Ti<sub>3</sub>C<sub>2</sub>T<sub>x</sub> Janus design, that enables minimized thermal emission, maximized solar absorption and good catalytic activity simultaneously, thereby achieving excellent photothermal catalytic performance. When applied to Sabatier reaction and reverse water-gas shift (RWGS) as demonstrations, we obtain an approximately 300% increase in catalytic yield through reducing the thermal emission of catalyst by ~70% under the same irradiation intensity. It is worth noting that the CO<sub>2</sub> methanation yield reaches 3317.2 mmol g<sub>Ru</sub><sup>-1</sup> h<sup>-1</sup> at light power of 2 W cm<sup>-2</sup>, setting a performance record among catalysts without active supports. We expect that this design opens up a new pathway for the development of high-performance photothermal catalysts.

Nature CommunicationsVol. 15(1)
Chinese Academy of Sciences (CN), Southern University of Science and Technology (CN), ShanghaiTech University (CN), Changchun Institute of Optics, Fine Mechanics and Physics (CN), Collaborative Innovation Center of Advanced Microstructures (CN), Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology (CN), Shaanxi University of Science and Technology (CN), Rice University (US), Nanjing University (CN)
National Natural Science Foundation of China, Government of Jiangsu Province, Natural Science Foundation of Jiangsu Province, Nanjing University, Southeast University, National Laboratory of Solid State Microstructures, Nanjing University, Wuhan Textile University, National Key Research and Development Program of China, Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities
Affordable and clean energy
Openalex Percentile: Top 1%
MXene and MAX Phase Materials
5.86
DOIOpen Access PDFOpenAlex
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