Role of Curvature in Stabilizing Boron-Doped Nanocorrugated Graphene

Mengkun Tian, Wesley D. Tennyson, Mina Yoon, Alexander A. Puretzky, David B. Geohegan, Gerd Duscher, Gyula Eres

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

Boron-doped carbon nanostructures have attracted great interest recently because of their remarkable electrocatalytic performance comparable to or better than that of conventional metal catalysts. In a previous work (Carbon 123, 605 (2017)), we reported that along with significant performance improvement, B doping enhances the oxidation resistance of few-layer graphene (FLG) that provides increased structural stability for intermediate-temperature fuel-cell electrodes. In general, detailed characterization of the atomic and electronic structure transformations that occur in B-doped carbon nanostructures during fuel-cell operation is lacking. In this work, we use aberration-corrected scanning transmission electron microscopy, nanobeam electron diffraction, and electron energy-loss spectroscopy (EELS) to characterize the atomic and electronic structures of B-doped FLG before and after fuel-cell operation. These data point to the nanoscale corrugation of B-doped FLGs as the key factor responsible for increased stability and high corrosion resistance. The similarity of the 1s to π* and σ* transition features in the B K-edge EELS to those in B-doped carbon nanotubes provides an estimate for the curvature of nanocorrugation in B-FLG.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)1276-1282
Number of pages7
JournalACS Applied Materials and Interfaces
Volume16
Issue number1
DOIs
StatePublished - Jan 10 2024

Funding

This work was supported by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), Office of Science, Basic Energy Sciences, Materials Sciences and Engineering Division. This work was performed, in part, at the Center for Nanoscale Materials, a U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science User Facility, and supported by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, under Contract no. DE-AC02-06CH11357. This research used resources of the Oak Ridge Leadership Computing Facility at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, which is supported by the Office of Science of the U.S. Department of Energy under Contract no. DE-AC05-00OR22725 and resources of the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center, a DOE Office of Science User Facility supported by the Office of Science of the U.S. Department of Energy under Contract no. DE-AC02-05CH11231 using NERSC award BES-ERCAP0024568. The authors acknowledge Jong Keum for assistance with the XRD data acquisition. This work was supported by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), Office of Science, Basic Energy Sciences, Materials Sciences and Engineering Division. This work was performed, in part, at the Center for Nanoscale Materials, a U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science User Facility, and supported by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, under Contract no. DE-AC02-06CH11357. This research used resources of the Oak Ridge Leadership Computing Facility at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, which is supported by the Office of Science of the U.S. Department of Energy under Contract no. DE-AC05-00OR22725 and resources of the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center, a DOE Office of Science User Facility supported by the Office of Science of the U.S. Department of Energy under Contract no. DE-AC02-05CH11231 using NERSC award BES-ERCAP0024568. The authors acknowledge Jong Keum for assistance with the XRD data acquisition. DOE-BES MSED grant number ERKCS81.

Keywords

  • B doping
  • EELS
  • NBED
  • STEM
  • carbocatalysis
  • curvature
  • nanocorrugated graphene

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