Effect of femtosecond laser-texturing on the oxygen evolution reaction of the stainless-steel plate

We studied the effect of femtosecond (FS) laser-texturing of 316 L stainless steel (SS) plates on their oxygen evolution reaction (OER). Here, the FS laser texturing is adapted to create oxyhydroxide layers with dimple structures on the pristine SS (denoted as B-SS) electrode. The single-side textured SS electrode is represented as FSSS-SS, and the double-side textured SS electrode is described as FSDS-SS. Upon FS laser texturing, significant elements variations of diffraction and photoelectron peak intensities profoundly influence their OER activity. As a result, the above electrode's OER overpotentials in 6.0 M potassium hydroxide (KOH) follow the order of B-SS (257 mV) > FSSS-SS (254 mV) > FSDS-SS (251 mV). However, the above order is reversed in the case of Tafel slopes viz., FSDS-SS (56 mV dec(-1)) > FSSS-SS (50 mV dec(-1)) > B-SS (47 mV dec(-1)). The FS laser textured electrodes exhibit a favorable OER activity regarding overpotential and current density. Besides, based on the Tafel slope analysis, the B-SS electrode shows accelerated OER kinetics. These adverse results may be due to the dimple morphology, reconfiguration of elemental composition, O/Ni/Fe ratios, and the passive nature of catalyst layers, which define the OER performance of SS electrodes.

Automated summary

The effect of femtosecond (FS) laser-texturing on the oxygen evolution reaction (OER) of 316 L stainless steel (SS) plates was studied. FS laser texturing was used to create oxyhydroxide layers with dimple structures on the SS electrodes. The FS laser textured electrodes showed improved OER activity in terms of overpotential and current density.