Recent progress of mesoporous carbons applied in electrochemical catalysis

Because of their advantages of high specific surface area, uniform and adjustable pore size and shape, and good electrical conductivity and chemical stability, mesoporous carbon materials have been widely used in the fields of catalysis, adsorption, gas separation and electrochemical energy storage. In recent years, doping and hybridizing multi-components with mesoporous carbon materials has given them tunable functionality, making them a hot topic in the field of materials science. This review first introduces strategies for the synthesis of mesoporous carbon materials by the soft-templating, hard-templating and template-free methods. Recent progress on mesoporous carbons and their composites used in electrochemical catalysis are then summarized, including heteroatom-doped mesoporous carbons and their composites with metal compounds. Their use in electrochemical catalysis includes the oxygen reduction reaction, oxygen evolution reaction, and hydrogen evolution reaction. Their use in organic electrocatalytic synthesis is also discussed. Finally, trends in the development of mesoporous carbons and their composites in electrochemical catalysis are considered.