Machine Learning Reveals Role‐Asymmetric Electronic Cooperation in Fe‐Based Dual‐Atom Catalysts

ABSTRACT Dual‐atom catalysts (DACs) provide a powerful platform for oxygen electrocatalysis, yet rational design remains limited by the lack of transferable mechanistic principles. Machine learning (ML) has the potential to address this gap, yet its role in mechanistic discovery remains largely underexplored despite its wide use in catalyst screening. Here, using extended phthalocyanines (M 1 M 2 ‐ePc), we establish an integrated DFT‐ML‐experiment framework that maps catalytic performance onto an interpretable electronic landscape. Screening 81 DFT‐computed and 360 ML‐predicted metal pairs identifies FeM‐ePc as a promising bifunctional catalyst family. Notably, SHapley Additive exPlanations (SHAP) analysis highlights the importance of electronic background and the key role of the secondary metal in regulating catalytic activity. First‐principles calculations further uncover a cooperative dual‐descriptor mechanism, in which d‐band center and charge transfer jointly govern bifunctional activity. Combining LASSO with SISSO yields compact analytical formulas that quantitatively reproduce η ORR and η OER , providing interpretable descriptors for DACs. Guided by these findings, FeCo‐ePc‐L with atomically dispersed Fe‐Co sites was synthesized to experimentally examine the ML‐guided prediction. This work highlights the utility of interpretable ML for mechanistic discovery in DACs by revealing role‐asymmetric electronic cooperation between paired metal centers.

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Publication Details

Journal
Advanced Materials
Published
2026-08-26
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1002/adma.74833
Primary Topic
Electrocatalysts for Energy Conversion
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
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article

Machine Learning Reveals Role‐Asymmetric Electronic Cooperation in Fe‐Based Dual‐Atom Catalysts

Boyun Xiao, Anyang Li, Shaobo Jia, Chou Wu et al.
Advanced Materials
Electrocatalysts for Energy Conversion
article

Machine Learning Reveals Role‐Asymmetric Electronic Cooperation in Fe‐Based Dual‐Atom Catalysts

Boyun Xiao, Anyang Li, Shaobo Jia, Chou Wu, Qiang Tan, Yawei Li, Haiyan Zhu, Jinqiao Tian, Lu Yang
article en

Abstract

ABSTRACT Dual‐atom catalysts (DACs) provide a powerful platform for oxygen electrocatalysis, yet rational design remains limited by the lack of transferable mechanistic principles. Machine learning (ML) has the potential to address this gap, yet its role in mechanistic discovery remains largely underexplored despite its wide use in catalyst screening. Here, using extended phthalocyanines (M 1 M 2 ‐ePc), we establish an integrated DFT‐ML‐experiment framework that maps catalytic performance onto an interpretable electronic landscape. Screening 81 DFT‐computed and 360 ML‐predicted metal pairs identifies FeM‐ePc as a promising bifunctional catalyst family. Notably, SHapley Additive exPlanations (SHAP) analysis highlights the importance of electronic background and the key role of the secondary metal in regulating catalytic activity. First‐principles calculations further uncover a cooperative dual‐descriptor mechanism, in which d‐band center and charge transfer jointly govern bifunctional activity. Combining LASSO with SISSO yields compact analytical formulas that quantitatively reproduce η ORR and η OER , providing interpretable descriptors for DACs. Guided by these findings, FeCo‐ePc‐L with atomically dispersed Fe‐Co sites was synthesized to experimentally examine the ML‐guided prediction. This work highlights the utility of interpretable ML for mechanistic discovery in DACs by revealing role‐asymmetric electronic cooperation between paired metal centers.

Advanced Materials
Ministry of Education of the People's Republic of China (CN), North China Electric Power University (CN), National Center for Supercomputing Applications (BG), Northwest University (CN), Xi'an Jiaotong University (CN)
Partnerships for the goals
Openalex Percentile: Top 81%
Electrocatalysts for Energy Conversion
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