LAUSR

5-Hydroxymethylfurfural (HMF) can be oxidized to 2,5-furan-dicarboxylic acid (FDCA) for the production of biorenewable plastics to replace fossil resourced polyethylene terephthalate (PET). Development of high-efficient electro-catalyst using renewable electricity as energy input and earth abundant metals as catalysts is highly desired. In this work, Ru cluster embedded Ni(OH) 2 nanosheets (Ru/Ni(OH) 2 ) are synthesized and exploited as electrochemical catalysts for the conversion of HMF to FDCA. Ru/Ni(OH) 2 exhibits significantly improved current density (40 mA cm -2 at 1.41 V vs. RHE) of over 7.7 times in comparison with Ni(OH) 2 , and nearly 100% conversion degree for HMF and 98.5% selectivity towards FDCA were obtained. Operando Raman experiment revealed the catalysis was facilitated by the interconversion between Ni 3+ and Ni 2+ . Density functional theory calculations further reveal the effect of Ru clusters of Ni(OH) 2 and thereby promoting HMF adsorption capacity on Ni sites to boost HMF oxidation activity. This work provides a novel strategy using Ru clusters to modify earth abundant Ni based catalyst for HMF oxidation to obtain high-value biomass-derived products.