posted on 2019-03-06, 00:00authored byMi-Ju Kim, Ji Eun Park, Sungjun Kim, Myung Su Lim, Aihua Jin, Ok-Hee Kim, Min Jeong Kim, Kug-Seung Lee, Jinsoo Kim, Seung-Soo Kim, Yong-Hun Cho, Yung-Eun Sung
An
earth-abundant and feasible air cathode electrocatalyst is of
importance for energy devices including fuel cells and metal–air
batteries. Herein, hierarchically porous S,N-co-doped carbon materials
derived from bamboo are prepared via pyrolysis of bamboo and thiourea
to function as oxygen reduction reaction electrocatalysts. Due to
their controlled mesopore ratio and increased effective dopant amount,
the S,N-co-doped bamboo carbons (SNBCs) present half-wave potentials
and stabilities comparable to those of commercial Pt/C catalysts.
As cathode materials for anion exchange membrane fuel cells and Zn–air
batteries, SNBCs exhibit high performances, attributed to their intrinsic
activities as well as well-developed secondary pore structure in the
catalyst layer. Thus, we demonstrate the viability of biomass-derived
catalysts for practical energy applications.