A new approach for enhancing the electrochemical performance of carbon felt electrodes by employing non-precious metal oxides is designed. The outstanding electro-catalytic activity and mechanical stability of Mn(3)O(4) are advantageous in facilitating the redox reaction of vanadium ions, leading to efficient operation of a vanadium redox flow battery.

The vital role of ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid on the structure and the oxygen reduction reaction activity of the non-precious-metal-based pyrolyzed catalyst is reported and elaborated. The resultant catalyst can overtake the performance of commercial Pt/C catalyst in an alkaline medium.

A convenient, one-pot, two-component synthesis of 2-(1-amidoalkyl)pyridines is reported, based upon the substitution of suitably-activated pyridine N-oxides by azlactone nucleophiles, followed by decarboxylative azlactone ring-opening. The synthesis obviates the need for precious metal catalysts to achieve a formal enolate arylation reaction, and constitutes a formally 'umpoled' approach to thi...

The reactions of 3-allenyl 3-hydroxyoxindoles with a variety of halogenated reagents in the presence of catalytic amounts of precious metal salts were explored. Both, rearrangement and oxycyclization reactions to give 4-(1-halovinyl)-quinolinediones or spirocyclic halooxindoles, respectively, are competitive pathways. The kind of functionalization is substrate and reaction conditions dependent.

Nitrogen doped graphitic layer encased cobalt (N-C@Co) nanoparticles, as novel non-precious-metal catalysts for the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR), were fabricated by a facile method using cyanamide and cobalt nitrate as precursors. The N-C@Co catalysts exhibited comparable catalytic performance, better stability and improved methanol tolerance towards the ORR than those of the commercial Pt/C...

Energy conversion and storage systems have recently attracted significant attention owing to increasing environmental energy problems. However, the slow kinetics of oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) evolution (OER) render their commercialization difficult. Many studies are being conducted replace precious metal catalysts that high activity for ORR OER but scarcity low stability. In this study, Sm...