No abstract

Substitutional nitrogen doping in graphene has been a very powerful tool to tailor the pristine property of graphene and furthermore extend its application. While nitrogen-doped graphene (N-graphene) has shown many potential applications in catalysis, electronics, sensors and so on, there is still a lack of accurate control of substitutional nitrogen doping, and higher performance toward various applications is always needed. This Perspective summarizes the ongoing developments toward better control of nitrogen doping. Moreover, two recent strategies aiming to promote the activity of N-graphene are also discussed.

Selectivity results obtained when glycerol electro-oxidation was carried out over various porous Au catalysts.

The C3 selectivity of carbon‐supported Au nanoparticles for glycerol electro‐oxidation was significantly enhanced by the interaction of Au with electro‐deposited Cu species. Notably, the C3 selectivity of supported Au nanoparticles doubled after 90 min of Cu electro‐deposition at +0.015 V. This result was obtained if glycerol electro‐oxidation was performed at +0.1 V for 2 h. The most selective catalysts contained an Au+ species that was generated by an interaction between Au and electro‐deposited Cu2O. The presence of Au+ increased the selectivity to glycerate and tartronate and suppressed C−C bond cleavage to glycolate and formate simultaneously.

A novel design of a microbial fuel cell is realized by constructing bio-cocatalyst beads immobilized with riboflavin-secreting Escherichia coli and decoupling them from an anodic biocatalyst. A microbial fuel cell loaded with these bio-cocatalyst beads shows significantly enhanced performance without occupying an active electrode surface area.