One of the major objectives of using the improved Hummers’ method was to exfoliate the graphene layers by oxidizing and thereafter reducing them to obtain highly conductive reduced graphene layers, which can be used in the construction of electronic devices or as a part of catalyst composites in energy conversion reactions. Herein, we have employed a similar idea to exfoliate the layered double hydroxide (LDH), which is proposed as a promising material for the oxygen evolution reaction (OER) electrocatalysis. Usually, the efficiency of these materials is largely restricted due to their sheetlike morphology, which is susceptible to stacking. In this work, NiFe-LDH sheets were fabricated on nickel foam in a one-step co-precipitation technique and their ultrathin nanosheets (∼2 nm) are obtained by in situ oxygen-plasma-controlled exfoliation. In addition, the oxygen vacancies in exfoliated sheets were generated by a chemical reduction method that further improved the electronic conductivity and overall electrocatalytic performance of the catalyst. This approach can address the limitations of NiFe-LDH, such as poor conductivity and low stability, making it more efficient for electrocatalysis. It is also observed that the catalyst having 60 s O-plasma exposure after chemical reduction, i.e., NiFe-OOHOV, outperformed remaining electrocatalysts and exhibited superior OER activity with a low overpotential of 330 mV to achieve a high current density of 50 mA cm–2. The catalyst also displayed an ECSA-normalized OER overpotential of 288 mV at a current density of 10 mA cm–2 and exhibited excellent long-term stability (120 h) in an alkaline electrolyte. Remarkably, ultrathin defect-rich catalyst continuously produced O2, resulting in a high faradaic efficiency of 98.1% for the OER.

Human survival might be at stake if the rate of carbon emission goes on like this in the near future. A clean energy alternative is a must to resolve the...

Layered double-hydroxides (LDHs) have emerged as a benchmark catalyst for oxygen evolution reactions (OER). To accelerate the reaction kinetics for OER, it became important to design a hybrid interfacial material...

Electrocatalytic water splitting is one of the key technology for the future energy systems envisioned for the storage of energy obtained from variable renewables and green fuels. The development of...

The immense potential of metal–organic frameworks (MOFs) in electrocatalytic applications have resulted in an upsurge of interest in these materials. Herein we demonstrate the rapid electrodeposition of bimetallic MOF (CuZn-BTC-250)...