Co₃O₄@Cu‐Based Conductive Metal–Organic Framework Core–Shell Nanowire Electrocatalysts Enable Efficient Low‐Overall‐Potential Water Splitting

Abstract

In the work reported herein, the electrocatalytic properties of Co3O4 in hydrogen and oxygen evolution reactions have been significantly enhanced by coating a shell layer of a copper‐based metal–organic framework on Co3O4 porous nanowire arrays and using the products as high‐performance bifunctional electrocatalysts for overall water splitting. The coating of the copper‐based metal–organic framework resulted in the hybridization of the copper‐embedded protective carbon shell layer with Co3O4 to create a strong Cu−O−Co bonding interaction for efficient hydrogen adsorption. The hybridization also led to electronically induced oxygen defects and nitrogen doping to effectively enhance the electrical conductivity of Co3O4. The optimal as‐prepared core–shell hybrid material displayed excellent overall‐water‐splitting catalytic activity that required overall voltages of 1.45 and 1.57 V to reach onset and a current density of 10 mA cm−2, respectively. This is the first report to highlight the relevance of hybridizing MOF‐based co‐catalysts to boost the electrocatalytic performance of nonprecious transition‐metal oxides.

Nanoparticle-Decorated Ultrathin La2O3 Nanosheets as an Efficient Electrocatalysis for Oxygen Evolution Reactions

“…To lead the exciting experimental developments of these energy systems to industrial applications, materials that catalyze OER with a high mass activity, a low overpotential, and a robust kinetic are highly desired [11][12][13]. Recent breakthroughs to lower the overpotential have revealed a large number of promising OER catalysts including carbon-based materials (e.g., graphene, CNT, and g-C 3 N 4 ), and alternatives of transition metals (e.g., Mn, Co, Ni, and Fe) [13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25]. However, the low mass activity, high cost, and complicated fabrication procedure are still hindering scalable implementations of these materials in replacing the benchmark IrO 2 and RuO 2 that have high cost and limited supply [5,13,15,26].…”

Bimetal−Organic Framework Derived High‐Valence‐State Cu‐Doped Co3O4 Porous Nanosheet Arrays for Efficient Oxygen Evolution and Water Splitting

“…The fabrication process of Cu−Co 3 O 4 NAs/NF is schematically illustrated in Figure a. Bimetal organic frameworks arrays are firstly grown on nickel foam (Cu, Co MOFs NAs/NF) through the self‐assembly of 2‐methylimidazole ligands with copper and cobalt metal ions . The surface structure of the Cu, Co−MOFs nanoarrays is varied by the scanning electron microscopy (SEM) observations (Figure S1), from which leaflike 2D structures with solid and smooth surface uniformly covers throughout nickel foam surface.…”

Recent Advances in Preparation and Applications of Magnetic Framework Composites

“…Conversely, it is an excellent way to add the MNPs which has been previously formed to the solution containing the inorganic metal ions and organic ligands of the desired MOFs. According to the structure of the MFCs, this idea can be divided into: embedding method, Layer‐by‐Layer (LbL) growth method and encapsulation method . Among them, the LbL method can obtain MFCs having a core–shell structure, and usually can control the size.…”

“…first tandem the magnetization and post‐synthetic modification to prepare mixed‐metal MFCs‐CoFe 2 O 4 /[Cu/Zn‐MOF]. In addition, Co 3 O 4 is also used to prepare Co 3 O 4 @Cu 3 (HHTP) 2 . Interestingly, in this study, Co 3 O 4 don′t act as a magnetizer but exert its excellent electrocatalytic properties.…”