One-second synthesis of carbon-supported Pd via Joule heating and enhanced electrocatalytic performance in methanol oxidation through promoting effect of multi-metallic oxides

•Pd catalyst with multi-metallic oxides (MMO) is fabricated through high-temperature shock.•Pd/MMO shows enhanced performance for MOR.•Enhanced MOR activity is due to the promoting effect of multi-metallic oxides. Developing highly efficient anodic catalyst is important, yet still challenging. Here, hybrid catalyst of Pd with multi-metallic oxides (Pd/MMO) was synthesized in one step on commercial carbon black with one-second high-temperature shock through Joule heating. Thanks to the promoting effect of multi-metallic oxides, the mass activity was enhanced by a factor of 1.8 over pristine Pd. The improvement was caused by the synergistic effect of multi-metallic oxides as its activity also surpassed that of hybrid catalysts of Pd with unary oxides. The superior performance of Pd/MMO was well maintained after a two-hour durability test, which showed the best anti-poisoning capability among all the catalysts evaluated. It demonstrated Joule-heating as a simple, fast, and powerful tool for synthesizing hybrid catalysts with excellent performance.