Solid oxide electrolysis cell (SOEC) is promising in CO2 conversion and renewable clean electricity energy storage. It can convert CO2 and H2O simultaneously into syngas or hydrocarbon fuel at the cathode, and produce high purity O2 at the anode.Perovskite-type oxides have the advantages of excellent doping ability, carbon deposition resistance and redox stability. However, the application of perovskite electrodes is limited due to insufficient electrocatalytic activity.Recently, a research team led by Prof. WANG Guoxiong and Prof. BAO Xinhe from the Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics (DICP) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) and their collaborators achieved efficient and stable CO2 electrolysis in SOEC. They found that redox cycle manipulations promoted the exsolution of high-density metal/perovskite interfaces, which improved the CO2 electrolysis performance and stability.This study was published in Nature Communications on September 27.High-density metal/perovskite interfaces achieve efficient and stable carbon dioxide electrolysis in solid oxide electrolysis cell (Image by LV Houfu and LIN Le)The researchers prepared Ru-doped Sr2Fe1.4Ru0.1Mo0.5O6-δ (SFRuM) double perovskite. They found that the repeated redox manipulations promoted the exsolution of RuFe alloy nanoparticles from 5900 μm-2 to 22680 μm-2, where the mean particle size was between 2.2 and 2.9 nm, thus regulating the density of the density of the RuFe@SFRuM interfaces.Combined with in situ atmosphere electron microscopy, elemental maps and electron energy loss spectroscopy, they revealed the formation and regeneration mechanism of RuFe@SFRuM interface under reducing and oxidizing atmosphere. "The enrichment in Ru species on the surface can promote the exsolution of high-density RuFe@SFRuM interfaces," said Prof. WANG.What's more, in situ atmosphere electron microscopy, electrochemical impedance spectroscopy combined with density functional theory calculations confirmed that the RuFe@SFRuM interface promoted CO2 adsorption and activation. Compared with the SFRuM cathode, the RuFe@SFRuM cathode had a 74.6% increase in current density for CO2 electrolysis at 1.2 V and 800 °C, and exhibited a high stability of CO2 electrolysis for 1000 h.The above work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China, the National Key Research and Development Program, and the Youth Innovation Promotion Association of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. (Text/Picture Houfu Lv and Le Lin)

　　Graphene-based composite phase change materials (PCMs) exhibit great potential in the field of solar-thermal energy conversion and storage.
　　Current synthesis methods of the graphene-based composite PCMs usually involve multi‐step processes that are generally complicated, time‐ and energy‐consuming, hindering its further practical application especially in large-scale solar-thermal energy utilization.
　　Recently, Prof. SHI Quan's group from the Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics (DICP) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) proposed a facile and straightforward one-step strategy of constructing graphene-based shape-stable PCMs with polyethylene glycol (PEG) in situ filled into a graphene oxide (GO) network structure hydrogel.
　　This study was published in Chemical Engineering Journal on Sept. 9.
　　Schematic diagram of the PEG/GO-PAM composite PCMs synthesis (Image by LI Yangeng)
　　Compared with the currently reported synthetic routes, the complexity, processing time and cost of the synthesis strategy are reduced in this newly proposed strategy.
　　The as-prepared composite PCMs showed a high PEG loading capacity up to 95 wt.%, and could maintain a relatively constant phase change enthalpy of 162.8 J/g even after 1000 phase transition cycles.
　　The composites also exhibited excellent solar-thermal energy conversion ability, which could quickly convert solar energy into thermal energy and store it in the PCMs with a conversion efficiency of up to 93.7%.
　　This work provides a new idea for large-scale preparation of graphene-based solar-thermal conversion composite PCMs.
　　The above work was supported by Joint Fund of the Yulin University and Dalian National Laboratory for Clean Energy, National Nature Science Foundation of China and Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics. (Text by LI Yangeng)

　　Prohibiting deep oxidation remains a challenging task in oxidative dehydrogenation of light alkane since the targeted alkene is more reactive than parent substrate.
　　Recently, Dr. TIAN Ming and Prof. WANG Xiaodong's group from the Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics (DICP) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) propsosed a strategy to inhibit deep oxidation by tailoring dual active sites to isolate dehydrogenation and oxidation instead of homogeneously active sites responsible for these two steps leading to consecutive oxidation of alkene.
　　This study was published in Nature Communications on Sept. 14.
　　Near 100% ethene selectivity achieved by tailoring dual active sites to isolate dehydrogenation and oxidation (Image by WANG Chaojie)
　　The researchers tailored dual active sites of Ni2+ Lewis acid sites (LAS) and NiO nanoclusters confined in HY framework wherein catalytic dehydrogenation of ethane occurs on Ni2+ LAS, resulting in the formation of ethene and hydrogen.
　　NiO nanoclusters with decreased oxygen reactivity were responsible for selective oxidation of hydrogen rather than over-oxidizing ethene. This achieves near 100% ethene selectivity at around 18% ethane conversion.
　　This study opens a new avenue for selectively oxidative dehydrogenation of light alkanes and could be extended to multiple oxidation reactions that tendentiously suffer from the plaguing of overoxidation.
　　The above work was supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China and National Key R&D Program of China. (Text by WANG Chaojie)

　　Alkali and alkaline earth metal (AM) are employed as indispensable catalyst promoters for industrial ammonia synthesis.
　　According to a study led by Prof. CHEN Ping from the Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics (DICP) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), alkali and alkaline earth metal are now play an important role in mediating dinitrogen reduction via a variety of processes that can be coupled with renewable energy harvest and storage.
　　This study was published in Chem on Sept. 22.
　　The researchers indicated that a prominent feature of recent progresses is the active participation of unconventional and reactive alkali or alkaline earth metal (AM)-based compounds in mediating dinitrogen reduction and ammonia synthesis via organometallic, thermocatalytic, electrochemical, and chemical looping processes. The AM-based compounds include hydrides, oxyhydrides, electrides, nitrides, and amides.
　　The elucidation of the unique chemistry of these AM-based materials as well as N2, H2 and NH3 can add fundamental understandings on the multi-functionalities of AM and therefore afford avenues for the rational development of materials and processes to tackle mild-condition ammonia synthesis.
　　In a broader sense, the insights of AM effect on the bellwether reaction-ammonia synthesis may have a profound impact on other AM-promoted chemical transformations.
　　This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China and the Youth Innovation Promotion Association of CAS. (Text by WANG Qianru)

　　Two-dimensional (2D) carbon materials with pseudocapacitive charge storage capacity are promising for high-performance micro-supercapacitors (MSCs).
　　Borocarbonitride, containing the C, B, N element in different proportions, has the similar structure with graphene. It is considered as a hybrid of graphene and hexagonal boron/nitrogen (BN).
　　Recently, a research group led by Prof. WU Zhongshuai from the Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics (DICP) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), in collaboration with Prof. LEI Weiwei from Deakin University, revealed the charge storage mechanism of 2D borocarbonitride nanomesh (BCNN) for high-performances MSCs.
　　This study was published in Energy Storage Materials on July 31.
　　The researchers synthesized 2D BCNN by carbonizing gel precursor of milk powder and boron oxide in 700, 800, and 900 °C, respectively, denoted as BCNN700, BCNN800, and BCNN900, as electrode for MSCs.
　　They found that the areal capacitance increased from 30.5 mF cm-2 for BCNN700-MSCs to 80.1 mF cm-2 for BCNN900-MSCs with a hydrogel electrolyte. Notably, BCNN900-MSCs could provide a high energy density of 67.6 mWh cm-3 with an ion-gel electrolyte, powering a liquid crystal display for 328 s.
　　Moreover, they investigated the electrochemical properties of BCNN900 by theoretical calculations. The models were designed with four parts, including a pure hexagonal carbon matrix (Pure-BCNN), porous carbon matrix (Pore-BCNN), nitrogen-doped carbon matrix (N-BCNN), and boron/nitrogen co-doped area (BN-BCNN).
　　They found that the charges mainly accumulated on the defects of N-BCNN and BN-BCNN network, while few charges gather on Pore-BCNN and pure carbon network. This indicated that the B and N elements doping would facilitate the charge transfer and increase the electrolyte adsorption, contributing to the improvement of capacitance. The micro-pores could improve the capacitance in the lower-voltage section and the boron/nitrogen doping improve the capacitance in the higher-voltage section.
　　This work paves a new avenue for designing two-dimensional carbon materials for high-performances MSCs.
　　This work was supported by National Key R&D Program of China and Dalian National Laboratory for Clean Energy. (Text by ZHANG Liangzhu)

　　A research group led by Prof. XIAO Jianping from the Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics (DICP) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) and their collaborators synthesized a single-atom Pb-alloyed Cu catalyst (Pb1Cu), which showed high activity for the electrochemical CO2 reduction reaction (CO2RR) with a selectivity of 96% to formate and stability of up to 180 h at 100 mA cm-2.
　　This study was published in Nature Nanotechnology on Sept. 16.
　　The researchers reported multi-path for CO2 reduction to formate, namely the reaction paths through COOH* and HCOO* intermediates. The reaction phase diagram was built based on the "energy global optimization" approach, describing the activity trend for CO2RR to formate. A double-peak activity trend was obtained owing to the consideration of multi-path.
　　They found that Cu preferred the COOH* path, resulting in the production of hydrocarbons and oxygenates, which exhibit limited selectivity and activity toward a specific product. However, Pb1Cu preferred the HCOO* path. The optimal HCOO* binding energy in Pb1Cu revealed either high activity or selectivity to formate via CO2RR. The agreement between experimental and theoretical activity trend confirms the reliability of multi-path mechanism.
　　The Cu site on the Pb1Cu step surface, rather than the single-atom Pb site, showed the highest CO2RR activity toward exclusive formate production. The free-energy diagram with the calculated electrochemical barriers also confirms the formate selectivity.
　　"The 'double-peak' describes a more accurate activity trend for CO2RR, providing a significant insight for catalyst design," said Prof. XIAO.