Synthesis of Highly Active and Stable Carbon by a Soft‐Template Hydrothermal Route as Pt Substrate for Oxygen Reduction Reaction

N‐doped mesoporous carbon spheres were synthesized by a microwave‐assisted ammonia‐catalyzed hydrothermal route (CFAHM) by using Pluronic® F127 as a soft‐template and m‐Aminophenol as both carbon and nitrogen source. Their physical and electrochemical properties were compared with those of carbon samples obtained by a conventional hydrothermal method (CFAH). The best results in terms of particle size, surface area, pore size distribution, conductivity and N‐content of the as‐prepared CFAHM samples were obtained in 17 M NH4OH at 120 °C for 5 min. After 1100 °C pyrolysis step, conductivity of CFAHM increased to 5.64 S cm−1 compared to 8.64 S cm−1 for CFAH sample. Remarkably, GDE experiments with xylene‐swelled CFAHM‐supported platinum exhibited an excellent activity for ORR (181 mA cm−2 @ 0.7 V) and ECSA retention (80 % after 10,000 ADT) under half‐cell conditions in 1 M H2SO4 at room temperature compared to only 57 mA cm−2 and 13 % for GDE with Pt/CVulcan reference material. Carbon synthesis via microwave‐assisted hydrothermal soft‐template: One very innovative aspect in this work is related to the hosting of Pt nanoparticles into the mesoporous cavities of carbon support spheres that allowed impressive enhancement of the Pt corrosion stability during accelerated electrochemical polarization test under half cell conditions in comparison with that of the state‐of‐the art catalyst.