Doped Nanocarbons Derived from Conducting Polymers toward ORR Electrocatalysts

Abstract

Developing nonprecious electrocatalysts for efficient oxygen reduction reactions (ORR) has aroused increasing interest recently. Doped nanocarbons derived from conducting polymers have emerged as a competitive class of nonprecious‐metal catalysts for the ORR because of their promising catalytic activities, long‐standing stability, and particularly low‐cost and facile preparation at a large scale via simple approaches. This review summarizes the recent progress of the preparation and application as ORR electrocatalysts of heteroatom doped nanocarbons derived from conducting polymers, and transition metal and heteroatom‐codoped nanocarbons from conducting polymers and metal salts. Finally, the challenges and further development of this field are also discussed.

Polypyrrole and Polythiophene Modified Carbon Nanotube‐Based Cathode Catalysts for Anion Exchange Membrane Fuel Cell

“…[17,18] Co-doping (e. g. with N, S [19,20] or N, P [21] ) of the nanocarbons has also been found to be beneficial for the preparation of highly active ORR electrocatalysts. [12,22] Jiang et al prepared N, S co-doped NPMC via pyrolysis of PPy and polythiophene (TPh) composite. The highest ORR activity was achieved when the PPy:PTh monomer mixture of 5 : 1 was used.…”

“…As examples, N‐doped graphene, [8] carbon nanotubes, [9] carbide‐derived carbons, [10] and different nanocarbon composites [11] have been studied for ORR activity, and show high electrocatalytic activity towards O 2 reduction. Recently, conducting polymer (CP)‐derived NPMC materials have gained attention due to their high catalytic activity, long‐term stability, low‐cost and simple preparation routes [12,13] . An additional benefit of using CP for catalyst preparation is the presence of N in the polymer structure (e. g. polyaniline, polypyrrole (PPy), polyacrylonitrile (PAN)), which excludes the necessity to use additional N precursor [14–16] .…”

“…Co‐doping (e. g. with N, S [19,20] or N, P [21] ) of the nanocarbons has also been found to be beneficial for the preparation of highly active ORR electrocatalysts [12,22] . Jiang et al.…”

“…Recently, conducting polymer (CP)-derived NPMC materials have gained attention due to their high catalytic activity, longterm stability, low-cost and simple preparation routes. [12,13] An additional benefit of using CP for catalyst preparation is the presence of N in the polymer structure (e. g. polyaniline, polypyrrole (PPy), polyacrylonitrile (PAN)), which excludes the necessity to use additional N precursor. [14][15][16] PPy-based NPMC materials have shown high activity towards the ORR.…”

“…[5,26,27] Electrocatalytic ORR activity of NPMC materials can arise from different active sites. Firstly, to incorporate as many ORRactive sites as possible, NPMC should have a high specific surface area [12,13,28] with the pore size range from 0.5 to 200 nm. [14] Metal-N x sites and metal-free N/C sites with high electrocatalytic ORR activity have attracted the most attention.…”