Construction of Dual-atom catalysts on MoTe2 monolayer to achieve high-efficiency OER/ORR performance

Developing efficient, economical and environmentally friendly multifunctional electrocatalysts is a prerequisite for developing renewable energy conversion and storage technologies. Dual-atom catalysts have significant catalytic performance compared to monoatomic catalysts due to the larger metal loading and synergistic effects between metal atoms, and the reduction of overpotentials and increase of the reaction rate are the keys to obtaining high-performance OER/ORR bifunctional electrocatalysts, as determined by the electrocatalytic thermodynamics and kinetics of electrocatalysis. This work investigates efficient electrocatalysts with bifunctional catalytic activity for OER/ORR. Modifying the MoTe2 material by doping with transition metal atoms shows that the catalysts exhibit better electrochemical stability due to higher solvation potentials. The Pd2@MoTe2 catalysts were screened for bifunctional electrocatalysts due to the change in the local chemical environments. The Pd2@MoTe2 catalysts have excellent bifunctional electrocatalytic activity with overpotentials for OER and ORR of 0.23 and 0.21 V. The results show it can compete with and outperform the currently developed catalysts. This excellent catalytic activity can be attributed to the change in the coordination environment around the modified material, resulting in a change in electronic properties. This effectively ensures excellent electrical conductivity and electron transfer to modulate the strength of adsorbate interactions and optimize the catalytic performance. This work provides new ideas for understanding and optimizing the active center of bifunctional catalysts and new strategies for designing high-performance multifunctional electrocatalysts for metal-air batteries.