Graphene, Cobalt Combine to Make Hydrogen from Water

Rice University scientists have discovered that graphene “doped with nitrogen and augmented with cobalt atoms” is an effective and durable catalyst for the production of hydrogen from water.
As quoted in the press release:

The Rice lab of chemist James Tour and colleagues at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the University of Texas at San Antonio and the University of Houston have reported the development of a robust, solid-state catalyst that shows promise to replace expensive platinum for hydrogen generation.
Catalysts can split water into its constituent hydrogen and oxygen atoms, a process required for fuel cells. The latest discovery, detailed in Nature Communications, is a significant step toward lower-cost catalysts for energy production, according to the researchers.

Tour commented:

What’s unique about this paper is that we show not the use of metal particles, not the use of metal nanoparticles, but the use of atoms. The particles doing this chemistry are as small as you can possibly get.
There are so many atoms inside the nanoparticle that never do anything. But in our process the atoms driving catalysis have no metal atoms next to them. We’re getting away with very little cobalt to make a catalyst that nearly matches the best platinum catalysts.

Click here to read the full Rice University press release.