Polymerization-dissolution strategy to prepare Fe, N, S tri-doped carbon nanostructure for a Zn–Air battery

Heteroatom doped carbon based hierarchical nanostructures are one of most interesting electrode materials for boosting oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) owing to the active electronic structure and appealing structural stability. Herein we demonstrated a ‘polymerization-dissolution’ method to prepare a highly stable Fe, N, S tri-heteroatom doped core-shell carbon (HCSC) nanostructural ORR catalyst. The unique advantages, including the uniformly dispersed N, S and Fe–N active sites, and the special leaf-like core-shell nanostructure, endow the optimized HCSC catalyst (HCSC-IV-H) owning high-efficient ORR activity. Moreover, a Zn–air battery assembled with HCSC-IV-H exhibits a higher open potential (1.430 V) and lower discharge overpotential, comparing with the commercial IrO ₂ + 20% Pt/C catalyst. The present work highlights a novel strategy to construct highly efficient heteroatom doped nano-carbon materials for renewable energy storage and conversion devices.