Sophisticated construction of single-atom cobalt catalyst based on microbial hyphae for high-performance hydrogenation

By fully utilizing the abundant surface functional groups of the fungus to coordinate with metal cobalt ions and the phosphorus and nitrogen elements of the organism itself to regulate the coordination environment of the central metal atoms, a cobalt-based single-atom catalyst TAHCF/Co-N was successfully constructed for selective hydrogenation of nitroaromatic compounds with good performance. [Display omitted] •Hyphae could be biocultured into macroscopic 3D structure.•Hyphae have natural functional groups for anchoring metal ions.•Fungal phosphorus sources could tailor the coordination of single metal sites.•The catalyst exhibits impressive performance for nitroarene hydrogenation. Utilizing biomass as a versatile catalyst building platform holds tremendous promise for catalyst design. In this study, we demonstrate a facile and effective method to fabricate high-performance catalysts using Trichoderma afroharzianum hyphae derived carbon fiber (TAHCF) embedded with Co1-N3P1 active sites for nitroaromatic hydrogenation. This strategy leverages the intrinsic self-assembly and metal ion adsorption capabilities of Trichoderma afroharzianum (TA). During the carbonization process, amino acid-rich fungi undergo transformation into biochar substrates co-doped with functional heteroatoms, facilitating the creation of TAHCF single-atom catalyst. Moreover, the catalytic performance can be further enhanced by tailoring the coordination structure of metal atoms on the carbon substrates. Remarkably, we achieve a high turnover frequency of 1553 h−1 for the hydrogenation of nitrobenzene, along with exceptional conversion and selectivity for various nitro compounds with the metal loading as low as 0.02 wt%. Our study presents a characteristic synthetic method that advances the design of single-atom catalysts by leveraging the inherent structure characteristics of biomass in the pursuit of energy sustainability.