Pd‐based catalysts with preferred morphologies and compositions are of great significance for boosting oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) and formic acid oxidation reaction (FAOR) performance, but the development of facile preparation methods is challenging. Therefore, an unconventional strategy is proposed to synthesize palladium‐copper cyanogel (Cux[Pd(CN)4]y·aH2O) and subsequently induce the formation of PdCu alloy nanocorals (ANCs), which has the advantages of being simple, green, and efficient. The synthesized PdCu ANCs consist of a 3D porous network structure and Pd‐enriched surface, which is beneficial to exposing more accessible active sites, accelerating mass/electron transfer rate, and strengthening chemical stability. By virtue of these merits, the PdCu ANCs exhibit superior activity and stability in both FAOR and ORR. Remarkably, the mass activity of PdCu ANCs catalyst in FAOR reaches 554.53 mA mgPd−1, with a 4.8‐fold enhancement compared to commercial Pd black. And the half‐wave potential of 0.861 V of PdCu ANCs catalyst in ORR surpasses the values of commercial Pd black and Pt black catalysts.

The isolated Pd single atoms anchored on graphene demonstrate a catalytic activity that is 21.3 times higher than that of Pd/C in the RhB hydrogenation reaction.

Ruthenium (Ru) has been theoretically considered a viable alkaline hydrogen evolution reaction electrocatalyst due to its fast water dissociation kinetics. However, its strong affinity to the adsorbed hydroxyl (OHad) blocks the active sites, resulting in unsatisfactory performance during the practical HER process. Here, we first reported a competitive adsorption strategy for the construction of SnO2 nanoparticles doped with Ru single‐atoms supported on carbon (Ru SAs‐SnO2/C) via atomic galvanic replacement. SnO2 was introduced to regulate the strong interaction between Ru and OHad by the competitive adsorption of OHad between Ru and SnO2, which alleviated the poisoning of Ru sites. As a consequence, the Ru SAs‐SnO2/C exhibited a low overpotential at 10 mA cm−2 (10 mV) and a low Tafel slope of 25 mV dec−1. This approach provides a new avenue to modulate the adsorption strength of active sites and intermediates, which paves the way for the development of highly active electrocatalysts.

For direct formic acid fuel cells (DFAFC), palladium (Pd)-based alloy catalysts with competitive morphology and elemental composition are essential to boost the performance of the formic acid oxidation reaction (FAOR) in the anode zone. Herein, we design and synthesize RuPdx alloy nano-network structures (ANs) via the facile wet-chemical reduction of Pd-Ru cyanogel (Pdx [Ru(CN)6]y·aH2O) as an effective electrocatalyst for the FAOR. The formation of Pd-Ru cyanogel depends on the facile coordination of K2PdCl4 and K3 [Ru(CN)6]. The unique structure of cyanogel ensures the presentation of a three-dimensional mesoporous morphology and the homogeneity of the elemental components. The as-prepared RuPd3 ANs exhibit good electrocatalytic activity and stability for the FAOR. Notably, the RuPd3 ANs achieve a mass-specific activity of 2068.4 mA mg−1 in FAOR, which shows an improvement of approximately 16.9 times compared to Pd black. Such a competitive FAOR performance of RuPd3 ANs can be attributed to the advantages of structure and composition, which facilitate the exposure of more active sites, accelerate mass/electron transfer rates, and promote gas escape from the catalyst layer, as well as enhance chemical stability.