Spatial-confinement synthesis of single-crystal ZrCo nanoparticles for ultrafast and long-life hydrogen/hydrogen isotope storage

• Published in: Chemical engineering journal (Lausanne, Switzerland : 1996) Vol. 473; p. 145342
• Main Authors: Huang, Gang, Liu, Xiaofang, Li, Zhenyang, Yuan, Yingbo, Li, Xinyu, Liu, Shiyuan, Yu, Ronghai, Shui, Jianglan
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Elsevier B.V 01.10.2023
• Subjects: Controlled nuclear fusion; Hydrogen isotope storage; Single crystal; Space confinement synthesis; ZrCo alloy; Controlled nuclear fusion; Hydrogen isotope storage; Space confinement synthesis; ZrCo alloy; Single crystal
• ISSN: 1385-8947; 1873-3212
• DOI: 10.1016/j.cej.2023.145342

[Display omitted] Micron to nanoscale ZrCo alloys are synthesized by electrospinning method and magnesiothermic reduction. The fibers act as space templates to control particle size. Compared with conventional polycrystalline smelted-ZrCo (∼140 μm), the nano-ZrCo exhibits much improved hydrogen and hydrogen isotope storage performances in terms of kinetics, thermodynamics, anti-disproportionation and cycle stability, and the performances improve with decrease of particle sizes. •Single-crystal ZrCo nanoparticles are synthesized by a spatial-confinement method.•Nano-ZrCo shows a 19-fold increase in hydrogenation kinetic rate.•Nano-ZrCo shows a two-fold improvement in cycle stability.•The significant decrease in disproportionation is due to high crystallinity.•The effects of particle size on hydrogen storage performances are revealed. ZrCo alloy is a safe and low-cost H-isotope storage material for controlled nuclear fusion, but traditional ZrCo prepared by smelting method suffer from slow gas uptake/release kinetics and serious degradation of cycle performance. Here, a “bottom-up” synthesis method is developed to prepare highly crystalline and high-purity ZrCo micron-/nanoparticles via a spatial-confinement strategy. The size-dependent hydrogen storage performances are systematically investigated from the perspectives of lattice constant, crystallinity, grain boundary, stress, and disproportionation phase transition. Compared with micron-scale polycrystalline smelted-ZrCo, the comprehensive performances of nanoscale ZrCo single crystals are significantly improved, including a 19-fold increase in kinetic rate, a ∼ 50% reduction of disproportionation ratio, and a two-fold improvement in cycle stability. This study provides a promising direction and an efficient synthetic method for the preparation of high-performance ZrCo alloys, which will facilitate their application in controlled nuclear fusion.