Exploring cost-effective non-precious metal electrocatalysts is vital for the large-scale application of clean energy conversion devices (i.e., fuel cells, metal-air batteries and water electrolyser). Herein, we present the construction of...

A nitrogen-doped biomass carbon catalyst SFNC(800) was prepared by carbonizing the cheap and readily available soybean flour as the starting material at 800 °C. By combining the SFNC(800) with the Keggin-type V-containing polyoxometalate Ch5PMoV2, a facilely recyclable catalytic system toward liquid-phase reductant-free aerobic oxidation of benzene to phenol was built. The combined catalyst SFNC(800)-Ch5PMoV2 exhibited a high activity with 11.2% phenol yield, 14.04 h–1 turnover frequency (TOF), and high potential for reusability under the optimized reaction conditions. The present TOF value surpassed almost all the ones of other similar previously reported reductant-free LBTP-O2 systems and was even higher than the previous noble metal involved system. On the basis of the characterization results and density functional theory calculations, the structure–activity analysis revealed that the graphitic N-containing moiety in the SFNC(800) is critical to absorb and activate the substrate benzene.

NiO is a popular TMO with high thermal and chemical stability and Co3O4 is a relatively more reducible TMO due to weaker metal-oxygen bond. Both are often used as catalysts...

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An extremely simple and inexpensive apparatus for preparation of the C60 and C70 fullerenes is described. An efficient separatory technique is described which implements a phenylglycine based HFLC column for preparation of high purity (99.99%) C60 and C70 samples. Treatment of C60 with osmium tetroxide and pyridine gives the osmate ester (2:1 adduct) and establishes that oxygen functionality can be added to C60 without disrupting the carbon framework. Raman spectroscopy of high purity C60 indicates that several lines previously not assigned to C60 (D.S.Bethune, G.Meijer, W.C.Tang, and H.J.Rosen, Chem.Phys.Lett.174, 219(1990)) are attributable to C60.