The current energy demand in the 21<sup>st</sup> century is expected to double by 2050. Finding efficient and clean alternatives to fossil fuels to counter the current energy crisis is of the utmost importance. Alcohols are extremely promising alternative sources due to their high electric energy density, and low carbon footprints. However, the potentials offered by alcohols have not yet been achieved because of the low power conversion and high catalyst poisoning during the electrooxidation reaction. Although nanostructured noble metal catalysts with higher catalytic surface area can address these issues, the use of insulating surfactant ligands to synthesize nanoparticles (NPs) limits the electron conductivity of the catalysts. Our group recently developed novel oxidation induced sol-gel assembly technique to remove the insulating surfactant from the NPs surface while keeping the NPs’ physical properties intact. Herein, ultrasmall Ag/Pt/Pd alloy NPs were synthesized via stepwise galvanic replacement reaction of preformed glutathione coated Ag NPs. The alloy NPs were later transformed into a large aerogel superstructure which exhibits directly connected pristine NPs, high surface area and meso-to-macropore structure. The oxidant to surfactant molar ratio was changed carefully to control the in-situ generation of HNO<sub>3</sub> which monitors the molar composition and exposure of Pt and Pd sites on the surface of the aerogel. The Ag/Pt/Pd aerogels showed significantly higher electrocatalytic activity and stability for both methanol and ethanol oxidation reactions than their corresponding precursor NPs, commercial Pt/C and Pd/C. The synergistic effects of the alloying, morphology, pristine active surface of NPs, improved conductivity, high surface area and porosity emerged from this novel synthetic approach will open up new avenues for designing the next generation of energy conversion catalysts and electrocatalysts.

Oxidative sol-gel assembly of Ag/Pt/Pd alloy nanoparticles into electrocatalytic active aerogel superstructure for the alcohols oxidation reaction.

Fall 2022 abstracts, posters, and presentations will launch in mid-September.

ACS Fall 2022

The official archive and repository for all ACS Meetings & Expositions abstracts and select posters or presentations.