Facile Surface Laser Modification of Nickel Foams for Efficient Water Oxidation Electrocatalysis

Abstract

Despite the recent efforts and progress on the transition metalbased electrocatalysts for water splitting, it is still a challenge to fabricate oxygen evolution reaction electrocatalysts with high performance, simultaneously via a simple, facile, and environment-friendly way. Herein, we report a facile strategy for the fabrication of NiFe oxides-based micro/nano-structures on Ni foams via simple femtosecond laser ablation, where the Ni : Fe ratio can be readily tuned by changing the amount of Fe precursors dropped on the Ni foams. The resulted electrocatalysts exhibit excellent oxygen evolution reaction activity with low overpotentials of 221 and 241 mV at 25 and 50 mA cm À 2 , and good long-term durability under high current density in alkaline condition, suggesting great potentials for practical applications.

Ru Nanoparticles on Carbon Skeletons for an Efficient Hydrogen Evolution Reaction in Alkaline Electrolyte

“…[5,6] Generally, noble metal-based catalysts (e. g., platinum and iridium oxide) are considered as the most effective catalysts to reduce the potential between OER and HER, [7][8][9] where however their high-cost and scarcity hinder the industrial application. [10,11] Because of these, increasing research efforts have been devoted to the design and construction of the earth-abundant transition metal-based catalysts, such as oxides, [12][13][14][15] (oxy)hydroxides, [3,16,17] sulfides, [18][19][20] phosphides, [21][22][23] and nitrides, [24,25] etc. However, most HER electrocatalysts are generally less active in alkaline condition due to the high energy barrier of the additional water dissociation process.…”