Atomically isolated nickel species anchored on graphitized carbon for efficient hydrogen evolution electrocatalysis

Abstract

Hydrogen production through electrochemical process is at the heart of key renewable energy technologies including water splitting and hydrogen fuel cells. Despite tremendous efforts, exploring cheap, efficient and durable electrocatalysts for hydrogen evolution still remains as a great challenge. Here we synthesize a nickel–carbon-based catalyst, from carbonization of metal-organic frameworks, to replace currently best-known platinum-based materials for electrocatalytic hydrogen evolution. This nickel-carbon-based catalyst can be activated to obtain isolated nickel atoms on the graphitic carbon support when applying electrochemical potential, exhibiting highly efficient hydrogen evolution performance with high exchange current density of 1.2 mA cm−2 and impressive durability. This work may enable new opportunities for designing and tuning properties of electrocatalysts at atomic scale for large-scale water electrolysis.

Recent Progress in Metal‐Organic Frameworks for Applications in Electrocatalytic and Photocatalytic Water Splitting

“…Such MOF‐derived nanoporous carbon materials usually exhibit exceptionally high surface areas, which can form strong coupling with metal oxides/metal to enhance the electrocatalytic activity and stability for water splitting 67, 70, 113, 114, 115, 116, 117. Thus, many investigations have attempted the synthesis of carbon‐metal/metal oxide composites from MOFs as electrocatalysts for the HER and OER.…”

Vanadium carbide nanoparticles encapsulated in graphitic carbon network nanosheets: A high-efficiency electrocatalyst for hydrogen evolution reaction

“…Recently, construction or encapsulation of electrocatalysts in carbon nanotubes (CNTs) [17][18][19], graphene [20,21], and other carbon-based materials [22][23][24][25][26] has been demonstrated to mitigate corrosion in acidic media thus improving the long-term activity and electrocatalytic activity as a result of the improved electrical contact between the active electrocatalyst with the conductive carbon substrate. However, it is not easy to Herein, hierarchical nanosheets (NS) composed of VC nanoparticles encapsulated in highly conductive mesoporous graphitic carbon network (VC-NS) are synthesized by a hydrothermal reaction followed by the low-temperature and environmentally friendly magnesium thermic reduction (MTR) using V 2 O 5 nanosheets as both the template and precursor, as schematically illustrated in Scheme 1.…”

Electrocatalytic hydrogen evolution reaction activity comparable to platinum exhibited by the Ni/Ni(OH) 2 /graphite electrode

“…Of these, Ni-based catalysts such as Ni 2 P (12, 13), NiFeP (14), NiFe layered double hydroxide (15)(16)(17), and Ni/ NiO/carbon nanotube (18) seem to be more promising for water splitting. It has been shown recently that activation of a Nicarbon-based catalyst through the application of an electrochemical potential results in HER activity comparable to Pt in acidic medium (6). We have been investigating the use of Ni along with Ni(OH) 2 as a potential catalyst for the purpose, since Ni(OH) 2 clusters with Pt and other transition metals (19)(20)(21)(22)(23) generally exhibit good HER activity and Ni itself is only next to Pt in activity.…”