Most recently, the iChEM Prof. Zhao-Xiong Xie’s group reported a facile wet-chemical route that allows the fabrication of novel excavated rhombic dodecahedral (ERD) PtCu3 alloy NCs with ultrathin nanosheets of high-energy {110} facets.

Ultrathin crystalline nanosheets give an extremely high surface area of a specific crystal facet with unique physical and chemical properties compared with normal three-dimensionally polyhedral nanocrystals (NCs). However, the ultrathin metal nanosheets tend to curl themselves or assemble with each other sheet by sheet, which may reduce the effective surface area and accordingly the catalytic activity to a great extent. Prof. Xie’s group have been devoted into this field and successfully synthesized ERD PtCu3 alloy NCs via a coreduction method in the presence ofn-butylamine. The ERD PtCu3 alloy NCs are constructed with ultrathin nanosheets of high-energy {110} facets. We found by a series of controlled experiments that the amine is vital for the formation of the unique ERD PtCu3 alloy NCs. Because of the special excavated structure, the surface area is very large (measured as 77m2g-1 by CO stripping). The measurement of electrochemical catalytic oxidation of formic acid showed that the ERD PtCu3 alloy NCs exhibit excellent electrocatalytic performance and high antipoisoning activity.

This project was funded by the Ministry of Science and Technology and National Natural Science Foundation of China (Project#: 21131005、21333008和J1030415).

Resources from: http://pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10.1021/ja413209q