Rational Synthesis of Porous Graphitic-like Carbon Nitride Nanotubes Codoped with Au and Pd as an Efficient Catalyst for Carbon Monoxide Oxidation.

The precise fabrication of efficient catalysts for CO oxidation is of particular interest in a wide range of industrial and environmental applications. Herein, a scalable method is presented for the controlled synthesis of graphitic-like porous carbon nitride nanotubes (gC3N4NTs) codoped with Au and Pd (Au/Pd/gC3N4NTs) as efficient catalysts for carbon monoxide (CO) conversion. This includes the activation of melamine with nitric acid in the presence of ethylene glycol and metal precursors followed by consecutive polymerization and carbonization. This drives the formation of porous one-dimensional gC3N4NT with an outstanding surface area of (320.6 m2 g-1) and an atomic-level distribution of Au and Pd. Intriguingly, the CO conversion efficiency of Au/Pd/gC3N4NTs was substantially greater than that for gC3N4NTs. The approach thus presented may provide new avenues for the utilization of gC3N4 doped with multiple metal-based catalysts for CO conversion reactions which had been rarely reported before.