Facile Room-Temperature In Situ Incorporation of Transition-Metal Selenide (TMSe) Nanoparticles into MOF-5 for Oxygen Evolution Reaction

Development of facile, low-cost, and highly efficient oxygen evolution reaction (OER) catalysts with excellent oxygen evolution activity and stability has been a major challenge in recent years. In this work, efficient TMSe@MOF-5 catalysts were synthesized by in situ incorporation of presynthesized transition-metal selenide nanoparticles (MnSe, FeSe, CoSe, NiSe, CuSe, and ZnSe) into MOF-5 at room temperature. All the synthesized composites were successfully characterized by powder x-ray diffraction analysis, Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy, Raman spectroscopy, scanning electron microscopy, energy-dispersive x-ray spectroscopy, elemental mapping, and ultraviolet-visible spectrophotometry. Among various TMSe@MOF-5/NF working electrodes, MnSe@MOF-5/NF showed higher OER catalytic activity, requiring an overpotential of only 170 mV to achieve a current density of 10 mA cm(-2) in alkaline medium with a Tafel slope of 61 mV dec(-1), which is superior to many other reported OER catalysts including state-of-the-art RuO2 (n(10) = 290 mV). It is believed that the higher OER activity of MnSe@MOF-5/NF is due to the formation of a heterojunction from Ni of the nickel foam to the MnSe@MOF-5 at the surface of the working electrode.