Medium entropy alloy wavy nanowires as highly effective and selective alcohol oxidation reaction catalysts for energy-saving hydrogen production and alcohol upgrade†

Alcohol-assisted water electrolysis offers an attractive path for on-demand hydrogen generation while concurrently producing value added carboxylates. However, the anodic alcohol oxidation reaction (AOR) often requires precious metal-based catalysts, yet is still plagued with high overpotential or limited mass activity. Herein we report a facile synthesis of medium entropy Au-doped PtAgRhCu alloy wavy nanowires for highly efficient AORs. The alloy design facilitates hydroxyl adsorption that promotes the conversion of the carbonaceous intermediates (e.g. CH₃CO*) to carboxylate products and weakens the adsorption of carboxylate products, resulting in greatly enhanced mass activity for four-electron AORs and highly selective upgrade of ethanol and ethylene glycol into value added acetate and glycolate. Furthermore, we constructed an alcohol assisted water electrolyser that delivers a current density of 100 mA cm⁻² at a cell voltage lower than 0.6 V and a current density of 1 A cm⁻² at a cell voltage of 1.2 V.