Strain Engineering of Nanoporous Copper for Electrochemical CO2 Reduction

CO2 reduction (CO2RR) bears promising capabilities that could aid in reaching net-zero targets by closing the carbon cycle. Cu has been shown to be the only metal that can catalyse the transfer of more than two electrons during CO2RR, thus, generating more valuable C2+ molecules. Nanoporous Cu made by dealloying brass usually have high surface distortion, which manifests as microstrain. Our recent study shows that such microstrain acts to enhance the catalytic properties of Cu for CO2RR. However, due to the high surface mobility of Cu atoms, and the extremely harsh cathodic condition of CO2RR, preserving such high microstrain still remians challenging. The use of synchrotron-based diffraction method will enable the detailed observation of how dealloying-induced Cu lattice strain evolves during the CO2RR condition and other electrochemical dealloying condition, which can help us outline new strategies for CO2RR catalyst design, and also to uncover more aspects of dealloying of brass.