Quasi-Two-Dimensional Earth-Abundant Bimetallic Electrocatalysts for Oxygen Evolution Reactions

The extremely large surface area offered by quasi-two-dimensional (2D) nanostructures is a great advantage for catalytic applications. While bimetallic materials have been discovered as a group of promising catalysts for electrochemical water splitting, a facile and reliable synthesis approach toward 2D morphology to fully release its electrochemical catalytic potential is still lacking. In this work, bimetallic Co-Mo-O ultrathin nanosheets were synthesized by ionic layer epitaxy with controlled composition ratio. The Co-Mo-O nanosheets exhibited a quadrangle shape with a uniform thickness of similar to 2.5 nm. This 2D morphology largely enriched the surface catalytic active site ratio. Particularly, nanosheets with 2:1 Co-to-Mo ratio showed a substantially enhanced OER catalytic activity with a 3 orders of magnitude higher mass activity compared to benchmark IrO2 and RuO2 in an alkaline environment. This study introduces a promising possibility for creating high-performance electrocatalysts from 2D bimetallic materials with a high efficiency for material utilization.

Automated summary

This study successfully synthesized bimetallic Co-Mo-O ultrathin nanosheets with enriched surface catalytic active site ratio, among which nanosheets with 2:1 Co-to-Mo ratio showed significantly enhanced OER catalytic activity. This 2D morphology of bimetallic materials introduces a promising possibility for creating high-performance electrocatalysts.