How Catalysts Secretly Lose Their Stability

Electrochemistry

Covalent organic frameworks (COFs) are promising catalysts, but their true mechanism is surprising. Researchers from Ruhr University Bochum (Kristina Tschulik and Pouya Hosseini) and the Max Planck Institutes for Solid State Research and for Sustainable Materials have shown that COFs’ catalytic activity doesn’t come from the frameworks themselves. Instead, the cobalt ions are released from the framework and transform into nanoparticles that perform the actual catalysis.

This discovery, published in Advanced Science (Nov 26, 2024), opens the door to designing far more efficient catalysts by combining organic frameworks with nanoparticles

https://news.rub.de/wissenschaft/2024-11-26-elektrochemie-wie-katalysatoren-heimlich-ihre-stabilitaet-verlieren