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Axially chiral biaryl diols have achieved great success in asymmetric catalysis. By contrast, axially chiral biaryl amino alcohols are far less developed. Herein, we have rationally designed a versatile C1‐symmetric biaryl amino alcohol scaffold 1‐(1‐amino‐pyrrol‐2‐yl)naphthalen‐2‐ol (NPNOL) on the basis of axially chiral C2‐arylpyrrole framework. For its enantioselective synthesis, the chiral phosphoric acid‐catalyzed asymmetric Attanasi reaction between 1,3‐dicarbonyl compounds and azoalkenes had been established. By using this practical method, a wide range of NPNOLs were readily prepared in high yields and excellent atroposelectivities (38 examples, up to 89 % yield and 99 % ee). DFT calculations were performed to reveal the reaction mechanism and the origins of the enantioselectivity. The easy transformations of NPNOL‐derived products into organocatalysts/ligands and their preliminary applications in asymmetric catalytic reactions demonstrated the promising utility of NPNOL. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Selective and deterministic assembly of particles is fundamentally significant for manufacturing functional devices. However, it is still a challenge to precisely and facilely manipulate particles of different sizes into different assembly patterns. Herein, a method is presented to achieve precise control over the formation of binary or ternary particle size‐sorted assemblies. We investigate the assembly process of particles by capillary confinement and show that different size‐sorted assemblies of multiple components can be realized by tuning the templated dewetting. By controlling the dewetting direction, receding contact angle, and pillar height of the template, assembly of dual‐ring patterns, "comet" structures, and patterns with component separation are regulated. These structures can be further diversified by tuning the composition of the particles. This approach is general for particle assemblies of different sizes and materials, which will be significant for the fabrication of printed micro/nanohybrid devices. Guided assembly: An efficient method is presented to achieve precise control over the particle size‐sorted assembly of different patterns from binary or ternary mixtures by controlling the templated dewetting behavior. The method is used to generate dual‐ring patterns, "comet" structures, and separated component patterns. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Perovskites exhibit excellent high‐temperature oxygen evolution reaction (OER) activities as the anodes of solid oxide electrolysis cells (SOECs). However, the relationship between ion ordering and OER performances is rarely investigated. Herein, a series of PrBaCo2−xFexO5+δ perovskites with tailored ion orderings are constructed. Physicochemical characterizations and density functional theory calculations confirm that the oxygen bulk migration and surface transport capacities as well as the OER activities are promoted by the A‐site cation ordering, but weakened by the oxygen vacancy ordering. Hence, SOEC with the A‐site‐ordered and oxygen‐vacancy‐disordered PrBaCo2O5+δ anode exhibits the highest performance of 3.40 A cm−2 at 800 °C and 2.0 V. This work sheds light on the critical role of ion orderings in the high‐temperature OER performance and paves a new way for screening novel anode materials of SOECs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Alkaline fuel cells can permit the adoption of platinum group metal‐free (PGM‐free) catalysts and cheap bipolar plates, thus further lowering the cost. With the exploration of PGM‐free hydrogen oxidation reaction (HOR) catalysts, nickel‐based compounds have been considered as the most promising HOR catalysts in alkali. Here we report an interfacial engineering through the formation of nickel‐vanadium oxide (Ni/V2O3) heterostructures to activate Ni for efficient HOR catalysis in alkali. The strong electron transfer from Ni to V2O3 could modulate the electronic structure of Ni sites. The optimal Ni/V2O3 catalyst exhibits a high intrinsic activity of 0.038 mA cm−2 and outstanding stability. Experimental and theoretical studies reveal that Ni/V2O3 interface as the active sites can enable to optimize the hydrogen and hydroxyl bindings, as well as protect metallic Ni from extensive oxidation, thus achieving the notable activity and durability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Electrosynthesis of hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) in the acidic environment could largely prevent its decomposition to water, but efficient catalysts that constitute entirely earth‐abundant elements are lacking. Here we report the experimental demonstration of narrowing the interlayer gap of metallic cobalt diselenide (CoSe2), which creates high‐performance catalyst to selectively drive two‐electron oxygen reduction toward H2O2 in an acidic electrolyte. The enhancement of the interlayer coupling between CoSe2 atomic layers offers a favorable surface electronic structure that weakens the critical *OOH adsorption, promoting the energetics for H2O2 production. Consequently, on the strongly coupled CoSe2 catalyst, we achieved Faradaic efficiency of 96.7 %, current density of 50.04 milliamperes per square centimeter, and product rate of 30.60 mg cm−2 h−1. Moreover, this catalyst shows no sign of degradation when operating at −63 milliamperes per square centimeter over 100 hours. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although the Turing structures, or stationary reaction‐diffusion patterns, have received increasing attention in biology and chemistry, making such unusual patterns on inorganic solids is fundamentally challenging. We report a simple cation exchange approach to produce Turing‐type Ag2Se on CoSe2 nanobelts relied on diffusion‐driven instability. The resultant Turing‐type Ag2Se‐CoSe2 material is highly effective to catalyze the oxygen evolution reaction (OER) in alkaline electrolytes with an 84.5 % anodic energy efficiency. Electrochemical measurements show that the intrinsic OER activity correlates linearly with the length of Ag2Se‐CoSe2 interfaces, determining that such Turing‐type interfaces are more active sites for OER. Combing X‐ray absorption and computational simulations, we ascribe the excellent OER performance to the optimized adsorption energies for critical oxygen‐containing intermediates at the unconventional interfaces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A considerable challenge in the conversion of carbon dioxide into useful fuels comes from the activation of CO2 to CO2.− or other intermediates, which often requires precious‐metal catalysts, high overpotentials, and/or electrolyte additives (e.g. ionic liquids). We report a microwave heating strategy for synthesizing a transition‐metal chalcogenide nanostructure that efficiently catalyzes CO2 electroreduction to carbon monoxide (CO). We found that the cadmium sulfide (CdS) nanoneedle arrays exhibit an unprecedented current density of 212 mA cm−2 with 95.5±4.0 % CO Faraday efficiency at −1.2 V versus a reversible hydrogen electrode (RHE; without iR correction). Experimental and computational studies show that the high‐curvature CdS nanostructured catalyst has a pronounced proximity effect which gives rise to large electric field enhancement, which can concentrate alkali‐metal cations resulting in the enhanced CO2 electroreduction efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The anode oxygen evolution reaction (OER) is known to largely limit the efficiency of electrolyzers owing to its sluggish kinetics. While crystalline metal oxides are promising as OER catalysts, their amorphous phases also show high activities. Efforts to produce amorphous metal oxides have progressed slowly, and how an amorphous structure benefits the catalytic performances remains elusive. Now the first scalable synthesis of amorphous NiFeMo oxide (up to 515 g in one batch) is presented with homogeneous elemental distribution via a facile supersaturated co‐precipitation method. In contrast to its crystalline counterpart, amorphous NiFeMo oxide undergoes a faster surface self‐reconstruction process during OER, forming a metal oxy(hydroxide) active layer with rich oxygen vacancies, leading to superior OER activity (280 mV overpotential at 10 mA cm−2 in 0.1 m KOH). This opens up the potential of fast, facile, and scale‐up production of amorphous metal oxides for high‐performance OER catalysts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Transition‐metal phosphides have stimulated great interest as catalysts to drive the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER), but their use as bifunctional catalytic electrodes that enable efficient neutral‐pH water splitting has rarely been achieved. Herein, we report the synthesis of ternary Ni0.1Co0.9P porous nanosheets onto conductive carbon fiber paper that can efficiently and robustly catalyze both the HER and water oxidation in 1 m phosphate buffer (PBS; pH 7) electrolyte under ambient conditions. A water electrolysis cell comprising the Ni0.1Co0.9P electrodes demonstrates remarkable activity and stability for the electrochemical splitting of neutral‐pH water. We attribute this performance to the new ternary Ni0.1Co0.9P structure with porous surfaces and favorable electronic states resulting from the synergistic interplay between nickel and cobalt. Ternary metal phosphides hold promise as efficient and low‐cost catalysts for neutral‐pH water splitting devices. Sheets and paper: Ternary Ni0.1Co0.9P porous nanosheets anchored onto conductive carbon fiber paper, can be used as a bifunctional catalytic material for driving both water reduction and oxidation reactions efficiently in neutral‐pH electrolyte under ambient conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Acidic environment, cobalt diselenide monolayers, interlayer coupling, two-electron oxygen reduction Keywords: acidic environment; cobalt diselenide monolayers; interlayer coupling; two-electron oxygen reduction EN acidic environment cobalt diselenide monolayers interlayer coupling two-electron oxygen reduction 1 1 1 12/15/21 20211220 NES 211220 B Electrocatalysis b Cobalt diselenide monolayers as selective catalysts for the oxygen reduction to H SB 2 sb O SB 2 sb in an acidic environment are reported by Min-Rui Gao et al. in their Research Article on page 26922. [Extracted from the article]

The new material consists of abundant Turing-type Ag SB 2 sb Se-CoSe SB 2 sb interfaces, which are active sites that allow for favorable chemisorption of surface oxygenated species, leading to enhanced energetics for the oxygen evolution reaction. Energy efficiency, multi-interface, oxygen evolution, reaction-diffusion model, Turing structure Keywords: energy efficiency; multi-interface; oxygen evolution; reaction-diffusion model; Turing structure EN energy efficiency multi-interface oxygen evolution reaction-diffusion model Turing structure 6828 6828 1 03/10/21 20210315 NES 210315 B Turing patterns b have been widely seen in living systems. [Extracted from the article]

The development of the hydrogen economy requires energy‐efficient catalytic electrodes for neutral‐pH electrolyzers, in which strong acids or bases are not applied, thus, avoiding environmental and handling problems. In their Communication on page 15445 ff. M.‐R. Gao, S.‐H. Yu, and co‐workers describe a new Janus nickel cobalt phosphide porous catalyst that can efficiently catalyze both water reduction and oxidation in 1 m phosphate buffer (pH 7) electrolyte under ambient conditions, showing potential for catalytical application in neutral water electrolysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]