Efficient and selective CO2 electroreduction into value-added chemicals and fuels emerged as a significant approach for CO2 conversion, however, it relies on catalysts with controllable product selectivity and reaction paths. In this work, by means of first-principles calculations, we identify five catalysts (TM@MoSi2N4, TM = Sc, Ti, Fe, Co and Ni) comprising transition-metal atoms anchored on a MoSi2N4 monolayer, whose catalytic performance can be controlled by adjusting the d-band center and occupation of supported metal atoms. During CO2 reduction, the single metal atoms function as the active sites activates the MoSi2N4 inert basal-plane, and as-designed electrocatalysts exhibit excellent activity in CO2 reduction. Interestingly, HCOOH is the preferred product of CO2 reduction on the Co@MoSi2N4 catalyst with a rate-determining barrier of 0.89 eV, while the other four catalysts prefer to reduce CO2 to CH4 with a rate-determining barrier of 0.81-1.24 eV. Moreover, MoSi2N4 is an extremely-air-stable material, which will facilitate its application in various environments. Our findings provide a promising candidate with high activity, catalysts for renewable energy technologies, and selectivity for experimental work.
@article{arxiv.2210.14211,
title = {Single-atom anchored novel two-dimensional MoSi2N4 monolayers for efficient electroreduction of CO2 to formic acid and methane},
author = {Wei Xun and Xiao Yang and Qing-Song Jiang and Ming-Jun Wang and Yin-Zhong Wu and Ping Li},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2210.14211},
year = {2022}
}