Carbothermal shock synthesis of high-entropy-alloy nanoparticles

Yonggang Yao; Zhennan Huang; Pengfei Xie; Steven D Lacey; Rohit Jiji Jacob; Hua Xie; Fengjuan Chen; Anmin Nie; Tiancheng Pu; Miles Rehwoldt; Daiwei Yu; Michael R Zachariah; Chao Wang; Reza Shahbazian-Yassar; Ju Li; Liangbing Hu

doi:10.1126/science.aan5412

Carbothermal shock synthesis of high-entropy-alloy nanoparticles

Science. 2018 Mar 30;359(6383):1489-1494. doi: 10.1126/science.aan5412.

Authors

Yonggang Yao¹, Zhennan Huang², Pengfei Xie³, Steven D Lacey¹, Rohit Jiji Jacob⁴, Hua Xie¹, Fengjuan Chen¹, Anmin Nie², Tiancheng Pu³, Miles Rehwoldt⁴, Daiwei Yu⁵, Michael R Zachariah⁴, Chao Wang⁶, Reza Shahbazian-Yassar⁷, Ju Li⁸, Liangbing Hu⁹

Affiliations

¹ Department of Materials Science and Engineering, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742, USA.
² Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC), Chicago, IL 60607, USA.
³ Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD 21218, USA.
⁴ Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering and Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742, USA.
⁵ Department of Nuclear Science and Engineering, Department of Materials Science and Engineering, and Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.
⁶ Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD 21218, USA. binghu@umd.edu rsyassar@uic.edu liju@mit.edu chaowang@jhu.edu.
⁷ Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC), Chicago, IL 60607, USA. binghu@umd.edu rsyassar@uic.edu liju@mit.edu chaowang@jhu.edu.
⁸ Department of Nuclear Science and Engineering, Department of Materials Science and Engineering, and Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA. binghu@umd.edu rsyassar@uic.edu liju@mit.edu chaowang@jhu.edu.
⁹ Department of Materials Science and Engineering, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742, USA. binghu@umd.edu rsyassar@uic.edu liju@mit.edu chaowang@jhu.edu.

PMID: 29599236
DOI: 10.1126/science.aan5412

Abstract

The controllable incorporation of multiple immiscible elements into a single nanoparticle merits untold scientific and technological potential, yet remains a challenge using conventional synthetic techniques. We present a general route for alloying up to eight dissimilar elements into single-phase solid-solution nanoparticles, referred to as high-entropy-alloy nanoparticles (HEA-NPs), by thermally shocking precursor metal salt mixtures loaded onto carbon supports [temperature ~2000 kelvin (K), 55-millisecond duration, rate of ~10⁵ K per second]. We synthesized a wide range of multicomponent nanoparticles with a desired chemistry (composition), size, and phase (solid solution, phase-separated) by controlling the carbothermal shock (CTS) parameters (substrate, temperature, shock duration, and heating/cooling rate). To prove utility, we synthesized quinary HEA-NPs as ammonia oxidation catalysts with ~100% conversion and >99% nitrogen oxide selectivity over prolonged operations.

Publication types

Research Support, U.S. Gov't, Non-P.H.S.
Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't