Ru doping NiCoP hetero-nanowires with modulated electronic structure for efficient overall water splitting

Herein, a novel Ru-doped bimetal phosphide (Ru-NiCoP) heterostructure electrocatalyst on Ni foam is successfully synthesized through a multi-step hydrothermal reaction, ion exchange, and phosphorization method for efficient overall water splitting in alkaline media. The doping of Ru and P can effectively optimize the electronic structure and expose more active sites. The unique 3D interconnected nanowires not only ensures the uniform distribution of Ru coupled with NiCoP, but also endows the Ru-NiCoP/NF with the large ECSA, the fast electron transport and the favorable reaction kinetics attributes. Benefiting from the compositional and structural advantages, Ru-NiCoP/NF catalyst exhibits significantly enhanced catalytic activities along with excellent stability, only needing 32.3 mV at 10 mA cm-2 for HER and 233.8 mV at 50 mA cm-2 for OER. In particular, when Ru-NiCoP/NF is employed as both cathode and anode electrodes, a small voltage of 1.50 V is required to reach 30 mA cm-2 for overall water splitting with an impressive stability. This study provides an alternative strategy on the design and development of high performance catalysts for overall water splitting and other energy conversion fields. (c) 2021 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Automated summary

The novel Ru-NiCoP/NF electrocatalyst exhibits enhanced catalytic activity and stability due to optimized electronic structure and more active sites, showing impressive performance in overall water splitting.