Graphene-Like Hydrogen-Bonded Melamine-Cyanuric Acid Supramolecular Nanosheets as Pseudo-Porous Catalyst Support.

Wu, Jun-Xi; Bag, Partha Pratim; Xu, Yan-Tong; Gong, Li; He, Chun-Ting; Chen, Xiao-Ming; Zhang, Jie-Peng · Adv Mater · 2021

basic_science · Level V

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Abstract

Behaving as structural protectors and electronic modulators, catalyst supports such as graphene derivatives are generally constructed by covalent bonds. Here, hydrogen-bonded ultrathin nanosheets are reported as a new type of catalyst support. Melamine (M) and cyanuric acid (CA) molecules self-assemble to form the graphite-like hydrogen-bonded co-crystal M-CA, which can be easily exfoliated by ultrasonic treatment to yield ultrathin nanosheets with thickness of ≈1.6 nm and high stability at pH = 0. The dynamic nanosheets form adaptive defects/pores in the synthetic process of CoP nanoparticles, giving embedded composite with high hydrogen evolution activity (overpotential of 66 mV at 10 mA cm<sup>-2</sup> ) and stability. Computational calculations, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, and X-ray absorption spectroscopy unveil the electron modulation effects of the nanosheets. This pseudo-porous catalyst support also can be applied to other metal phosphides.