Manganese oxide rock on a chip with cables

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Nature Catalysis covers all areas of catalysis, incorporating the work of scientists, engineers and industry. March issue now live.

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  • historical laboratory equipment

    This series brings together our thematic retro News & Views offerings. These short articles reflect on historical developments in the fields of catalysis and their impact on contemporary research.

  • CO<sub>2</sub> Reimagined

    In acknowledgement of the five-year anniversary of the Paris Agreement, this Focus is dedicated to progressing the fundamental science and practical implementation of this technology to advance climate goals.

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  • Ethylene oxide is a key platform chemical that is produced industrially from the epoxidation of ethylene on silver catalysts, but the precise mechanism remains elusive. Now, in a joint computational–experimental effort, a phase of the silver catalyst grown on (100) facets that contains square-pyramidal subsurface oxygens and is stabilized by strongly adsorbed ethylene is identified as the active phase, and the mechanism is revealed.

    • Dongxiao Chen
    • Lin Chen
    • Zhi-Pan Liu
    Article
  • Nanoparticles are often stabilized by capping ligands but the specific role of such ligands during catalytic processes is often ignored. Now, in situ techniques including spatially resolved infrared nanospectroscopy reveal the ligand-assisted formation of a catalytic microenvironment on the surface of silver nanoparticles with nanoscale precision during CO2 electroreduction.

    • Yu Shan
    • Xiao Zhao
    • Peidong Yang
    Article
  • Unstrained aryl–aryl bonds are among the most inert bonds in organic chemistry. Now the development of a split cross-coupling strategy enables the direct functionalization of such bonds through Rh-catalysed C–C cleavage and cross-coupling with aryl halides, providing a method for biaryl synthesis.

    • Congjun Yu
    • Zining Zhang
    • Guangbin Dong
    Article
  • The synthesis of well-defined heterostructure interfaces can be leveraged to design advanced catalysts. Now a catalyst consisting of carbon-supported Janus particles with crystalline Ru and amorphous CrOx sides is shown to achieve high performance for both alkaline hydrogen oxidation and evolution reactions due to the synergy between both sides.

    • Bingxing Zhang
    • Jianmei Wang
    • Wenping Sun
    Article
  • In 2018 a descriptor was put forward to correlate the activity of various electrocatalytic reactions on carbon-based single-atom catalysts, but some data the work was based on were later found to be incorrect. This work revisits and amends the original 2018 study while presenting a modified version of the φ descriptor.

    • Haoxiang Xu
    • Daojian Cheng
    • Xiao Cheng Zeng
    Article
  • Catalytic conjunctive cross-coupling for the generation of densely functionalized sp3-rich scaffolds that are often found in biologically active compounds is underdeveloped. Now, iron-catalysed dicarbofunctionalization of olefins with dialkylzinc and haloalkanes provides access to synthetically challenging C(sp3)-rich molecules.

    • Tong-De Tan
    • Juan M. I. Serviano
    • Ming Joo Koh
    Article
    • The development of bimetallic catalysts is often hindered by the heavy workload of the classical trial-and-error method. Now, a distinct mechanism demonstrates that breaking down the net thermochemical reaction into the corresponding electrochemical half-reactions offers a facile approach to design bimetallic catalysts by analysing each putative half-reaction.

      • Bo-Hang Zhao
      • Bin Zhang
      News & Views
    • While skeletal editing stands as a powerful approach for simplifying synthetic procedures and obtaining complex molecules, viable methodologies remain limited. Now, a smart photoredox protocol, involving the insertion of carbon atoms into the indene core, gives access to a wide library of functionalized naphthalenes.

      • Marina Sicignano
      • Paolo Costa
      News & Views
    • The lack of stability of critical raw material-free electrocatalysts during the oxygen evolution reaction in acidic electrolytes lies beneath the use of Ir-based electrocatalysts in polymeric water electrolysis. Here, a strategy to enhance γ-MnO2 stability in acid is proposed. Theoretical and spectroscopic approaches reveal that increasing the fraction of O atoms in the appropriate position, namely Opla, prevents Mn dissolution during water electrolysis.

      • Sergio Rojas
      News & Views
    • The coenzyme Q biosynthetic pathway has evaded full characterization for decades, in part due to the inherent insolubility of coenzyme Q and the instability of its membrane-associated biosynthetic enzymes. Now, researchers have resurrected an active ancestral coenzyme Q metabolon in vitro that has unveiled valuable insights into previously uncharacterized aspects of coenzyme Q biosynthesis.

      • Kelsey J. Feustel
      • Catherine F. Clarke
      News & Views

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