A Decade of Electrocatalysis with Metal Aerogels: A Perspective
Weishan Li, Beibei Weng, Xiaoyue Sun, Bin Cai, René Hübner, Yunjun Luo, Ran Du
Abstract
Nowadays, great efforts have been spent on addressing concerns over energy and environmental crises. Among these efforts, electrocatalysis is widely recognized and studied for its high efficiency and easy processability. As a class of emerging electrocatalysts, metal aerogels (MAs) stand out in the last decade. In virtue of their three-dimensional conductive pathways, their library of catalytically/optically active sites, and their robust network structures, MAs have unique advantages in electrocatalysis. However, due to the short history of MAs, there is insufficient research on them, leaving significant room for material design and performance optimization. This perspective will mainly focus on electrocatalysis with MAs, aiming to summarize the state-of-the-art progress and to guide the on-target design of efficient MAs-based electrocatalysts towards energy- and environment-related applications.