Electrochemistry will play a pivotal role in our transition away from fossil fuels to a net zero society. While batteries and fuel cells are set to decarbonise transportation, electrolysers can enable the sustainable synthesis of our most coveted chemicals, such as H
2 and NH
3. It turns out that some of the reactions that we aim to accelerate in water electrolysis, such as H
2 evolution, are exactly the reactions that we wish to inhibit in Li ion batteries and during N
2 reduction. To that end, in our group we translate techniques and insight from battery science to electrosynthesis and vice versa. I will present our mechanistic studies on the electrocatalysis of (i) O
2 evolution for water electrolysis on iridium based and nickel based oxides
1 and (ii) N
2 reduction to NH
3 on Li-based electrodes in organic electrolytes
2,3 and (iii) parasitic gas evolution in Li ion batteries. Our studies incorporate electrochemical measurements, electrochemical mass spectrometry, operando optical spectroscopy, secondary ion mass spectrometry, x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and density functional theory; using the combination of these techniques, we build a holistic picture of the factors controlling these technologically critical reactions. 1 Francas, L., Corby, S., Selim, S., Lee, D., Mesa, C., Godin, R., Pastor, E., Stephens, I. E. L., Choi, K.-S. & Durrant, J.
Nat. Commun. 10, 5208, (2019). 2 Andersen, S. Z., Colic, V., Yang, S., Schwalbe, J. A., Nielander, A. C., McEnaney, J. M., Enemark-Rasmussen, K., Baker, J. G., Singh, A. R., Rohr, B. A., Statt, M. J., Blair, S. J., Mezzavilla, S., Kibsgaard, J., Vesborg, P. C. K., Cargnello, M., Bent, S. F., Jaramillo, T. F., Stephens, I. E. L., Norskov, J. K. & Chorkendorff, I.
Nature 570, 504, (2019). 3 Westhead, O., Jervis, R. & Stephens, I. E. L.
Science 372, 1149, (2021).
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