Functional materials Figure 1. (a) Steps of ZnO nanorods synthesis on carbon cloth. (b) Schematic of ZnO nanorod reduction progress to Zn metal: 1.) initiation at the triple phase boundary among carbon cloth, ZnO nanorod and electrolyte; 2.) development of an electronically conductive pathway along the nanorod generator; 3.) radial progression as reactants diffuse through the porous outer Zn layer. (c) Selection of SEM (1), STXM (2) and ptychography (4, 6) images together with Zn chemical-state maps from STXM (3) and ptychography reconstruction (5) highlighting the morphochemical evolution of the ZnO/Zn nanorod resulting from electrochemical formation. Reproduced with permission under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International Public License CC BY 4.0 Copyright. E. Emanuele1, A.G. Agrios2,3, A. Alleva1, V. Bonanni4, R. Ciancio5, A. Gianoncelli4 F. Guzzi4, G. Kourousias4, A. Li Bassi1, A. Macrelli1, P. Ronchese5, I. Sifat2,3 M. Žižić4, B. Bozzini1 1 Department of Energy, Politecnico di Milano, Milan, Italy ² School of Civil & Environmental Engineering, University of Connecticut, Storrs, USA ³ Center for Clean Energy Engineering, University of Connecticut, Storrs, USA ⁴ Elettra - Sincrotrone Trieste S.C.p.A., Trieste, Italy ⁵ Area Science Park, Trieste, Italy e-mail: elisa.emanuele@polimi.it, agrios@uconn.edu Acknowledgments We acknowledge Elettra Sincrotrone Trieste for providing access to its synchrotron radiation facilities and for financial support Co-funding was received from ZnOrgBat project (no. 23034) under the EIT RawMaterials, part of the Horizon Europe funding scheme. This study was carried out within the MOST – Sustainable Mobility Center activities funded from the European Union Next-GenerationEU (PIANO NAZIONALE DI RIPRESA E RESILIENZA (PNRR) – MISSIONE 4 COMPONENTE 2, INVESTIMENTO 1.4 – D.D. 1033 17/06/2022, CN00000023). This manuscript reflects only the authors’ views and opinions, neither the European Union nor the European Commission can be considered responsible for them. Original paper E. Emanuele et al., Adv. Sustainable Syst. 9, 2400921 DOI: 10.1002/adsu.202400921. Fig. 1 Elettra Highlights 2024–2025 29
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