Arraying faceted manganese oxides for selective ethylene electro-oxidation to ethylene glycol in aqueous electrolytes.

ABSTRACT: The electro-oxidation of ethylene to ethylene glycol (EG) offers a sustainable pathway for chemical manufacturing, but demands selective non-precious-metal (NPM) electrocatalysts. Here, we design and fabricate a class of arrayed Mn₂O₃ electrode, which shows a high EG selectivity in practically-favorable aqueous electrolytes among NPM catalysts. By screening various manganese oxides, we first pinpoint Mn₂O₃ to be the most selective to EG. Density functional theory calculations further reveal that the (111) facet facilitates the second OH* addition to ^*C₂H₄OH, the rate-limiting step toward EG. These fundamental findings motivate us to controllably synthesize the (111)-dominant Mn₂O₃ nanoarrays,

SUBMITTER: Liang NN 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12783720 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature