Highly Efficient and Selective Cu/MnO x Catalysts for Carbon Dioxide Reduction

Catalytic reduction of carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) to chemical and energy feedstocks is of great importance to both environmental improvement and energy regeneration. Herein, a Cu decorated MnO x nanowirebased heterogeneous catalyst was rationally designed via a facile hydrothermal method toward the optimization of their performance in CO 2 reduction. The synthesized Cu/MnO x combines well-dispersed Cu nanoparticles on MnO x nanowires, exhibiting a nearly complete conversion efficiency and 100% selectivity toward reverse water gas shift to produce CO under mild reaction conditions (425 °C). It is found that Cu/MnO x with Cu/Mn molar ratio of 1:1 with a strong interaction between metal and support possessed rich surface oxygen vacancies and lattice strain, resulting in the optimal activity with CO 2 conversion rate of 13.8 μmol g cat –1 s –1 and TOF of 4.32 mol mol cat –1 h –1 . The strategy to optimize the metal–support interaction in this work has opened a new avenue for the design of advanced noble-metal-free catalysts for more heterogeneous catalytic applications.