Carbon dispersed copper-cobalt alloy nanoparticles: A cost-effective heterogeneous catalyst with exceptional performance in the hydrolytic dehydrogenation of ammonia-borane

• For the first time, carbon supported CuCo alloy NPs were synthesized and characterized.
• For the first time, CuCo/C catalyst was employed in the hydrolytic dehydrogenation of AB.
• CuCo/C catalyst provides unprecedented performance among the 3d-metals based heterogeneous catalysts.

Herein, we report the development of a new and cost-effective nanocatalyst for the hydrolytic dehydrogenation of ammonia-borane (NH3BH3), which is considered to be one of the most promising solid hydrogen carriers due to its high gravimetric hydrogen storage capacity (19.6 wt%) and low molecular weight. The new catalyst system consisting of bimetallic copper-cobalt alloy nanoparticles supported on activated carbon was simply and reproducibly prepared by surfactant-free deposition-reduction technique at room temperature. The characterization of this new catalytic material was done by the combination of multi-pronged techniques including ICP-MS, XRD, XPS, BFTEM, HR-TEM, STEM and HAADF-STEM-line analysis. The sum of their results revealed that the formation of copper-cobalt alloy nanoparticles (dmean = 1.8 nm) on the surface of activated carbon (CuCo/C). These new carbon supported copper-cobalt alloy nanoparticles act as highly active catalyst in the hydrolytic dehydrogenation of ammonia-borane, providing an initial turnover frequency of TOF = 2700 h−1 at 298 K, which is not only higher than all the non-noble metal catalysts but also higher than the majority of the noble metal based homogeneous and heterogeneous catalysts employed in the same reaction. More importantly, easy recovery and high durability of these supported CuCo nanoparticles make CuCo/C recyclable heterogeneous catalyst for the hydrolytic dehydrogenation of ammonia-borane. They retain almost their inherent activity even at 10th catalytic reuse in the hydrolytic dehydrogenation of ammonia-borane at 298 K.

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