As an energy carrier, hydrogen holds the prominent advantages of high gravimetric energy density, high abundance, and zero emissions, yet its effective storage and transportation remain a bottleneck problem for the widespread applications of hydrogen energy.
To address such an issue, different types of hydrogen storage materials are developed and carefully investigated in the past decades. Among them, magnesium hydride (MgH2) has been considered as one of the most promising hydrogen storage materials because of its high capacity, excellent reversibility, sufficient magnesium reserves, and low cost.
However, the poor thermodynamic and kinetic properties of MgH2 limit its practical applications (the enthalpy of the hydrogen desorption is 74.7 kJ mol-1 H2 and the desorption energy barrier is about 160 kJ mol-1 H2).
Alloying, catalyzing, and nano-structuring have been proposed and applied to overcome the abovementioned drawbacks. Among these strategies, the introduction of the catalysts can change the local electronic configuration of Mg/MgH2 and reduce the energy barrier for H2 dissociation/recombination.
The nanostructured Mg-based materials own the advantages of shortening the diffusion pathway and increasing surface reaction area, hence the hydrogen absorption and desorption rate can be significantly accelerated. The idea of designing core-shell nanostructured Mg-based hydrogen storage materials aims to synergize the strengths of the above two modification methods.
Through such a strategy, advanced Mg-based materials with core-shell nanostructures can be constructed and optimized, which are promising for both mobile and stationary applications.
A new review from the team of Professor Jianxin Zou at Shanghai Jiao Tong University summarizes research progress in the field of core-shell nanostructured magnesium-based hydrogen storage materials was published in Industrial Chemistry & Materials recently, which mainly focuses on the preparation methods, microstructures, properties, and related mechanisms. The goal is to point out the design principles and future research trends of Mg-based hydrogen storage materials for industrial applications.
Core-shell nanostructured Mg-based hydrogen storage materials show excellent hydrogen absorption and desorption kinetics and…