Engineering Nickel/Palladium Heterojunctions for Dehydrogenation of Ammonia Borane: Improving the Catalytic Performance with 3D Mesoporous Structures and External Nitrogen-Doped Carbon Layers

Catalysts based on metallic NPs have shown high activities in heterogeneous catalysis, due to their high fractions of surface-active atoms, which, however, will lead to the sacrifices in stability and recycle of catalysts. In order to balance well the relationship between activity, stability, and recovery, in this paper, we have constructed a 3D mesoporous sphere structure assembled by N-doped carbon coated Ni/Pd NP heterojunctions (Ni/Pd@N–C). This obtained Ni/Pd@N–C has shown high catalytic activity, durability and recyclability for the hydrolytic dehydrogenation of ammonia borane (AB). Further investigations, including experimental and theoretical results, have shown that the unique structural features, the synergistic effect between Ni and Pd, and the coating of N-doped carbon layer are responsible for the good catalytic performance of Ni/Pd@N–C mesoporous spheres.