The development of environmentally friendly methods for the fabrication of new energy materials is being constantly pursued to relieve the global environmental and energy issues. During the past decade, carbon-based metal-free electrocatalysts with enhanced electrocatalytic performances by multiple heteroatom doping and superior electrical conductivity have shown their great potential to replace noble metal electrocatalysts in fuel cells. However, the fabrication of highly efficient carbon-based electrocatalysts from biomass and environmental waste remains challenging. Herein, we report the facile and scalable fabrication of nitrogen and sulfur co-doped carbon microtubes (N,S-CMTs) by pyrolysis of catkins (environmental pollutant) having adsorbed toxic dyes (water contaminant). With optimized parameters such as conductivity, doping, porosity, and surface area, the N,S-CMTs demonstrate significantly enhanced electrocatalytic performances in the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) compared with those of commercial 20% Pt/C. Our work offers a promising alternative to platinum-based electrocatalysts toward the ORR in fuel cell applications.

中文翻译：

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生物质衍生的氮和硫共掺杂碳微管用于氧还原反应

为了减轻全球环境和能源问题，正在不断地寻求开发用于制造新能源材料的环保方法。在过去的十年中，通过多次杂原子掺杂而具有增强的电催化性能和优异的导电性的碳基无金属电催化剂显示出了巨大的潜力，可替代燃料电池中的贵金属电催化剂。然而，由生物质和环境废物制造高效的碳基电催化剂仍然具有挑战性。在此，我们报告了通过吸附有毒染料（水污染物）的柳絮（环境污染物）的热解，可以轻松，可扩展地制造氮和硫共掺杂碳微管（N，S-CMT）。具有优化的参数，例如电导率，掺杂，孔隙率，与表面积相比，N，S-CMTs在氧还原反应（ORR）中的电催化性能比市售20％Pt / C显着提高。我们的工作为燃料电池应用中的ORR提供了一种有希望的替代铂基电催化剂的方法。