Publications by Valery Okatenko

Alloying as a Strategy to Boost the Stability of Copper Nanocatalysts during the Electrochemical CO2 Reduction Reaction

Raffaella Buonsanti, Anna Loiudice, Anastasia Blokhina, Kevin Rossi, Dragos-Constantin Stoian, Valery Okatenko, Mark Adrian Newton, Alexander Nicolas Chen

2023

Voltage-driven Chemical Reactions Enable the Synthesis of Tunable Liquid Ga – Metal Nanoparticles

Raffaella Buonsanti, Anna Loiudice, Pascal Alexander Schouwink, Krishna Kumar, Coline Marie Agathe Boulanger, Valery Okatenko, Alexander Nicolas Chen

Nanosized particles of liquid metals are emerging materials which hold promise for applications spanning from microelectronics to catalysis. Yet, the knowledge of their chemical reactivity is largely unknown. Here, we study the reactivity of liquid Ga and ...

2023

Voltage-driven Reactivity of Liquid Ga and CuGa Nanoparticles for Electrocatalytic CO2 Reduction and Synthesis

Valery Okatenko

The rising atmospheric level of carbon dioxide, CO2, contributes to climate change and poses urgent need to find scalable solutions both to decrease its emissions and to be able to recycle it, if the goals of Paris Agreement to limit the temperature rise a ...

EPFL2023

The spatial distribution of cobalt phthalocyanine and copper nanocubes controls the selectivity towards C-2 products in tandem electrocatalytic CO2 reduction

Raffaella Buonsanti, Anna Loiudice, Valery Okatenko, Min Wang

The coupling of CO-generating molecular catalysts with copper electrodes in tandem schemes is a promising strategy to boost the formation of multi-carbon products in the electrocatalytic reduction of CO2. While the spatial distribution of the two component ...

ROYAL SOC CHEMISTRY2023

Investigation of Ethylene and Propylene Production from CO2 Reduction over Copper Nanocubes in an MEA-Type Electrolyzer

Raffaella Buonsanti, Valery Okatenko

Previous work carried out in fully liquid environ-ments and at low current densities has demonstrated that highly uniform faceted copper nanocrystals display different selectivity profiles in CO2 reduction compared to polycrystalline copper. As part of ong ...

AMER CHEMICAL SOC2022

The native oxide skin of liquid metal Ga nanoparticles prevents their rapid coalescence during electrocatalysis

Raffaella Buonsanti, Anna Loiudice, Dragos-Constantin Stoian, Jan Vávra, Valery Okatenko, Laia Castilla Amorós

Liquid metals (LMs) have been used in electrochemistry since the 19th century, but it is only recently that they have emerged as electrocatalysts with unique properties, such as inherent resistance to coke-poisoning, which derives from the dynamic nature o ...

2022

Tailoring Morphology and Elemental Distribution of Cu-In Nanocrystals via Galvanic Replacement

Raffaella Buonsanti, Emad Oveisi, Pascal Alexander Schouwink, Valery Okatenko, Laia Castilla Amorós

The compositional and structural diversity of bimetallic nanocrystals (NCs) provides a superior tunability of their physico-chemical properties, making them attractive for a variety of applications, including sensing and catalysis. Nevertheless, the manipu ...

AMER CHEMICAL SOC2022

Copper Nanocrystal Morphology Determines the Viability of Molecular Surface Functionalization in Tuning Electrocatalytic Behavior in CO2 Reduction

Raffaella Buonsanti, James Richard Pankhurst, Valery Okatenko, Pranit Srinivas Iyengar

Molecular surface functionalization of metallic catalysts is emerging as an ever-developing approach to tuning their catalytic performance. Here, we report the synthesis of hybrid catalysts comprising copper nanocrystals (CuNCs) and an imidazolium ligand f ...

2021

Colloidal Nanocrystals as Electrocatalysts with Tunable Activity and Selectivity

Raffaella Buonsanti, Seyedehbehnaz Varandili, Cedric David Koolen, Dragos-Constantin Stoian, Jan Vávra, James Richard Pankhurst, Valery Okatenko, Pranit Srinivas Iyengar

Correlating the catalyst activity, selectivity, and stability with its structure and composition is of the utmost importance in advancing the knowledge of heterogeneous electrocatalytic processes for chemical energy conversion. Well-defined colloidal nanoc ...

2021