Nitrogen and fluorine dual-doped carbon black as an efficient cathode catalyst for oxygen reduction reaction in neutral medium

Fuel cells (FCs) have attracted world-wide attention due to their clean and sustainable performance. One of the key bottlenecks for the industrial development of FCs is looking for an alternative electrocatalyst which is inexpensive, sustainable, and high-performance for oxygen reduction reactions (ORR). In this work, fluorine (F)-doped carbon blacks (XC-72-F) are synthesized. In addition, nitrogen, fluorine (N,F) co-doped carbon blacks (XC-72-F-N) are facilely prepared by one-step hydrothermal method. The XC-72-F-N presents excellent ORR activity with higher potential of -0.17 V than XC-72-F (-0.20 V) in neutral medium. Furthermore, XC-72-F and XC-72-F-N possess high specific surface areas of 328 m2g-1 and 206 m2g-1, superior methanol-tolerance, sulfide-tolerance and better stability to that of Pt/C for ORR in neutral medium. The XC-72-F-N favors a quasi four-electron pathway of ORR with water as the main product and it is appropriate for application of microbial fuel cells (MFCs).