Noble metal nanomaterials have been widely used as catalysts. Common techniques for the synthesis of noble metal often result in crystalline nanostructures. The synthesis of amorphous noble metal nanostructures remains a substantial challenge. We present a general route for preparing dozens of different amorphous noble metal nanosheets with thickness less than 10 nm by directly annealing the mixture of metal acetylacetonate and alkali salts. Tuning atom arrangement of the noble metals enables to optimize their catalytic properties. Amorphous Ir nanosheets exhibit a superior performance for oxygen evolution reaction under acidic media, achieving 2.5-fold, 17.6-fold improvement in mass activity (at 1.53 V vs. reversible hydrogen electrode) over crystalline Ir nanosheets and commercial IrO2 catalyst, respectively. In situ X-ray absorption fine structure spectra indicate the valance state of Ir increased to less than + 4 during the oxygen evolution reaction process and recover to its initial state after the reaction.

Solar evaporation, which enables water purification without consuming fossil fuels, has been considered the most promising strategy to address global scarcity of drinkable water. However, the suboptimal structure and composition designs still result in a trade‐off between photothermal conversion, water transport, and tolerance to harsh environments. Here, an ultrastable amorphous Ta2O5/C nanocomposite is designed with a hollow multishelled structure (HoMS) for solar evaporation. This HoMS results in highly efficient photoabsorption and photothermal conversion, as well as a decrease of the actual water evaporation enthalpy. A superfast evaporation speed of 4.02 kg m−2 h−1 is achieved. More importantly, a World Health Organization standard drinkable water can be achieved from seawater, heavy‐metal‐ and bacteria‐containing water, and even from extremely acidic/alkaline or radioactive water sources. Notably, the concentration of pseudovirus SC2‐P can be decreased by 6 orders of magnitude after evaporation.

Molecular sieving is of great importance to proton exchange in fuel cells, water desalination, and gas separation. Two-dimensional crystals emerge as superior materials showing desirable molecular permeability and selectivity. Here we demonstrate that a graphdiyne membrane, an experimentally fabricated member in the graphyne family, shows superior proton conductivity and perfect selectivity thanks to its intrinsic nanomesh structure. The trans-membrane hydrogen bonds across graphdiyne serve as ideal channels for proton transport in Grotthuss mechanism. The free energy barrier for proton transfer across graphdiyne is ~2.4 kJ mol −1 , nearly identical to that in bulk water (2.1 kJ mol −1 ), enabling “transparent” proton transport at room temperature. This results in a proton conductivity of 0.6 S cm −1 for graphdiyne, four orders of magnitude greater than graphene. Considering its ultimate pore size of 0.55 nm, graphdiyne membrane blocks soluble fuel molecules and exhibits superior proton selectivity. These advantages endow graphdiyne a great potential as proton exchange material.