A generalized approach for enhancing contact-electro-catalysis of oxides in a broad temperature range by fluorination.
basic_science · Level V
Where this comes from
- Record sourced from PubMed, PMID 41372136.
- Also identified by DOI 10.1038/s41467-025-66002-5 and PMC identifier 12695925.
- Licence recorded as CC BY-NC-ND.
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Abstract
Contact-electro-catalysis (CEC) has emerged as a sustainable and effective strategy for promoting chemical reactions. While polymers are the mostly used CEC catalysts, their limited contact-electrification (CE) performance at high temperatures limits the application of CEC in some environment. Here, we engineer fluorinated functional groups onto a series of oxides (SiO<sub>2</sub> Al<sub>2</sub>O<sub>3</sub>, ZrO<sub>2</sub> and MgO) for enhancing their CE abilities. The fluorinated SiO<sub>2</sub> (F-SiO<sub>2</sub>), for example, exhibits comparable CEC efficiency to that of polymers at room temperatures, and, more importantly, superior performance at elevated temperatures up to 180 °C. This should be mainly ascribed to the thermal stability of F-SiO<sub>2</sub> and the facilitated electron transfer enabled by fluorinated functional groups. The practicability of F-SiO<sub>2</sub> is verified by CEC-leaching of ternary cathodes of spent lithium-ion battery at 70 °C, with leaching efficiencies for all elements exceeding 90% within 300 min. Given the fluorination-based improvement is feasible for various oxides, we expect this strategy could not only enrich the spectrum of effective CEC catalysts, but also render a general approach for more efficient CEC process in a broad temperature window.