Several metal nanostructures such as Au [
81-
86], Ag [
42,
58,
87] and Pd [
41,
44,
88-
90] show excellent catalytic activity of electrocatalytic CO
2RR [
91], but the main product is CO. Other metal nanostructures such as Cu, Bi could provide various reduction products [
92,
93], but the ability of CO
2 conversion is limited. Therefore, preparing core-shell catalysts with various metals could take the core-shell structural advantages and provide a promising means to enhance the performance of electrochemical CO
2RR [
94-
103]. Sun
et al. obtained AuFe-CSNP through leaching out surface Fe of AuFe-CSNP during the electrochemical reduction process (
Figs. 3a and
b) [
48].
Fig. 3c shows the model diagram of the CO
2RR process of Au-mental (M) catalyst. According to the calculation of silico quantum mechanics rapid screening (QM-RS), Au-Fe alloys have a low
*COOH formation energy (0.46 eV) and CO desorption energy (0.17 eV). Therefore, Au-Fe alloys are considered to have the potential to improve CO
2 reduction performance. As predicted by the calculation results, AuFe-CSNP exhibits superior mass activity of 48.2 mA/mg towards electrochemical CO
2RR, which is approximate 100 times higher than Au NPs. To estimate the effect of Fe leaching on CO
2RR, Au atom on the surface is further removed to produce Schottky defects. Based on the DFT calculations, the surface defects can reduce the formation of
*COOH by 0.19 eV, which confirms that the Schottky defect has a great impact on the catalytic performance of AuFe-CSNPs (
Fig. 3d). It demonstrates that the superior activity could be attributed to the defects caused by the surface Fe leaching. Zhu
et al. prepared AuPd-CSNP by one-pot synthesis method, and the FE
CO reached 96.7% at −0.6 V [
43]. Through high-angle annular dark field- scanning transmission electron microscopy (HAADF-STEM) and X-ray energy dispersive spectrometry (XEDS) mapping, the element composition and distribution of Au
60Pd
40-CSNP and Au
94Pd
6-CSNP can be clearly observed (
Figs. 4a and
b). The atomic model diagrams of m-Au, m-Pd, m-Au
60Pd
40, m-Au
75Pd
25 and m-Au
94Pd
6 are shown in
Fig. 4c. Moreover, it is obvious that when Au: Pd = 94:6, the Pd shell will not be observed by XEDS mapping. In Au, Pd and Au
xPd
100-x NPs, the selectivity of CO increases with the increase of Au content (
Fig.s 4d-
g). The mass activity and specific activity of Au
94Pd
6-CSNP are higher than other catalysts at −0.9 V to −0.4 V.
Figs. 4h and
i are the model catalysts with Au: Pd =
x: (100 –
x), which can be abbreviated as m-Au
xPd
100-x. The surface of pure Au has a very high free energy barrier (~0.98 eV) for the formation of
*COOH intermediate, whereas the thermodynamic barrier of pure Pd is much smaller (~0.18 eV). It can be obtained from
Fig. 4h that the activation of CO
2 to
*COOH by m-Au
60Pd
40 is 0.10 eV easier than that of pure Pd, which is partly because of strain and ligand effect between Au and Pd, and synergistic results of
*COOH coordination changes. In addition, Pd and Au will receive electrons after alloying, and then will lead the downshift of d-band center, but the tensile strain will make d-band center upshift. The overall contribution of these two effects makes the d-band center of Pd upshift to the Fermi energy level and enhance the adsorption of
*COOH. Therefore, m-Au
94Pd
6 surface has the highest
*COOH free energy among all the bimetallic surfaces and low HER competition (
Fig. 4i). Liu
et al. employed polyol reduction combined with PVP ligand orientation to deposit Au on Ag NWs for the preparation of Ag@Au NWs (
Fig. 5a) [
49]. As shown in
Figs. 5b–
d, Ag@Au
0.5 NWs show the superior catalytic activity and highest FE
CO (
Fig. 5b). Moreover, Ag@Au
0.5 NWs have different CO selectivity at various potentials in CO
2-saturated 0.1 mol/L KHCO
3 and CO
2-saturated 0.1 mol/L KCl electrolyte (
Fig. 5e). CO
2-saturated 0.1 mol/L KHCO
3 as a buffer solution can maintain a neutral environment, while the pH of CO
2-saturated 0.1 mol/L KCl electrolyte will rise as the reaction proceeding, thus inhibiting HER. Additionally, the strong interaction between CO
2 and Cl
− improves the ability of CO
2 capture, resulting in the higher catalytic performance of Ag@Au
0.5 NWs in 0.1 mol/L KCl solution (
Figs. 5f and
g).