Innovative Catalyst Design of Sea-Urchin-like NiCoP Nanoneedle Arrays Supported on N-Doped Carbon Nanospheres for Enhanced HER Performance

Hydrogen (H2) stands as a clean energy alternative to fossil fuels, especially within the domain of the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER), offering prospective solutions to mitigate both environmental and energy-related challenges. In this work, we successfully synthesized a sea-urchin-like catalyst, specifically a nickel-cobalt phosphide nanoneedle array on N-doped carbon nanospheres (Ni0.5Co1.5P@NCSs), for efficient HER by a sequential hydrothermal and low-temperature phosphating process. The catalyst exhibits sea-urchin-like structures, offering a specific surface area of 298 m2 g-1 and consequently furnishing a greater abundance of active sites. Comparing with non-sea-urchin-like Ni0.5Co1.5P@CN catalysts, the Ni0.5Co1.5P@NCSs exhibit an overpotential of 163 mV at 10 mA cm-2, a Tafel slope of 60 mV dec-1, and a maintained current density of approximately 90% during 50 h of continuous electrolysis. Experiments demonstrate that the outstanding electrochemical properties of the Ni0.5Co1.5P@NCSs originate from nitrogen doping of carbon spheres, the distinctive morphology of sea-urchin-like nanoneedle arrays, and simultaneous enhancements in intermediate adsorption energy, charge transfer, and electrolyte diffusion channel shortening. This work emphasizes a preparation strategy for synthesizing an attractive electrocatalyst with a low cost and efficient HER performance.

Synergistic phase and crystallinity engineering in cubic RuSe2 catalysts towards efficient hydrogen evolution reaction

Herein, cubic RuSe2 electrocatalysts with different 1T phase ratios (ranging from 20.53% to 64.97%) and crystallinities (ranging from 1.72% to 89.10%) were developed by a fast and efficient microwave-assisted synthesis method.

Flower-like tungsten-doped Fe–Co phosphides as efficient electrocatalysts for the hydrogen evolution reaction

In this article, we introduce W into Fe–Co phosphides to optimize the hydrogen adsorption energy thereby accelerating the kinetics of the HER.