Peaks and pitfalls of electrocatalytic CO 2 reduction descriptor models (opens in new tab)

Identifying activity descriptors is critical for the development of efficient electrocatalysts. Here we systematically investigate the effect of electronic structure variations of metal alloys on the electrochemical CO2 reduction. For this, we prepare gold, silver and palladium alloys of various compositions, allowing to continuously tune the d-band centre and work function. Our results indicate that while the d-band centre is the decisive factor for CO production, the work function is needed...