Solution combustion derived oxygen vacancy-rich Co(3)O(4) catalysts for catalytic formaldehyde oxidation at room temperature

Fabricating abundant oxygen vacancies is crucial for non-noble metal oxides to catalyze formaldehyde (HCHO) oxidation at room temperature. Here, a simple one-pot preparation method via solution combustion was found to produce oxygen vacancy-rich Co(3)O(4) catalysts, avoiding delicate defect engineering. The catalyst was evaluated to result in 52% HCHO conversion in a dynamic flow reaction with ∼6 ppm HCHO, which was higher as compared to some other Co(3)O(4) catalysts prepared in three methods of sol–gel, deposition precipitation and thermal decomposition. The optimal catalyst also exhibited high durability with steady HCHO conversion (∼47%) for more than 50 h. The catalyst characterizations revealed that the explosive solution combustion brought out two particular features of Co(3)O(4), namely, the porous network structure with nano-holes and the abundant oxygen vacancies. The latter was demonstrated to increase the reactive oxygen species and to improve the reducibility and the oxygen transport capacity of Co(3)O(4). The two features and the derived properties are beneficial to the activity and durability of Co(3)O(4). The solution combustion method can serve as a simple and feasible way to fabricate abundant oxygen vacancies to provide room-temperature activity of Co(3)O(4) for HCHO elimination at room temperature.