In situ synthesis of a nickel boron oxide/graphdiyne hybrid for enhanced photo/electrocatalytic H2 evolution

Developing highly active catalysts for photo/electrocatalytic water splitting is an attractive strategy to produce H-2 as a renewable energy source. In this study, a new nickel boron oxide/graphdiyne (NiBi/GDY) hybrid catalyst was prepared by a facile synthetic approach. Benefitting from the strong electron donating ability of graphdiyne, NiBi/GDY showed an optimized electronic structure containing lower valence nickel atoms and demonstrated improved catalytic performance. As expected, NiBi/GDY displayed a high photocatalytic H-2 evolution rate of 4.54 mmol g(-1) h(-1), 2.9 and 4.5 times higher than those of NiBi/graphene and NiBi, respectively. NiBi/GDY also displayed outstanding electrocatalytic H-2 evolution activity in 1.0 M KOH solution, with a current density of 400 mA/cm(2) at an overpotential of 478.0 mV, which is lower than that of commercial Pt/C (505.3 mV@400 mA/cm(2)). This work demonstrates that GDY is an ideal support for the development of highly active catalysts for photo/electrocatalytic H-2 evolution. (C) 2021, Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Automated summary

A new NiBi/GDY hybrid catalyst was prepared in this study, showing optimized electronic structure and improved catalytic performance for both photocatalytic and electrocatalytic H-2 evolution. GDY proves to be an ideal support for the development of highly active catalysts in this field.