Ruthenium-cobalt nanoalloys encapsulated in nitrogen-doped graphene as active electrocatalysts for producing hydrogen in alkaline media

Jianwei Su, Yang Yang, Guoliang Xia, Jitang Chen, Peng Jiang and Qianwang Chen ()
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Jianwei Su: Hefei National Laboratory for Physical Science at Microscale, University of Science and Technology of China
Yang Yang: Hefei National Laboratory for Physical Science at Microscale, University of Science and Technology of China
Guoliang Xia: Hefei National Laboratory for Physical Science at Microscale, University of Science and Technology of China
Jitang Chen: Hefei National Laboratory for Physical Science at Microscale, University of Science and Technology of China
Peng Jiang: Hefei National Laboratory for Physical Science at Microscale, University of Science and Technology of China
Qianwang Chen: Hefei National Laboratory for Physical Science at Microscale, University of Science and Technology of China

Nature Communications, 2017, vol. 8, issue 1, 1-12

Abstract: Abstract The scalable production of hydrogen could conveniently be realized by alkaline water electrolysis. Currently, the major challenge confronting hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) is lacking inexpensive alternatives to platinum-based electrocatalysts. Here we report a high-efficient and stable electrocatalyst composed of ruthenium and cobalt bimetallic nanoalloy encapsulated in nitrogen-doped graphene layers. The catalysts display remarkable performance with low overpotentials of only 28 and 218 mV at 10 and 100 mA cm−2, respectively, and excellent stability of 10,000 cycles. Ruthenium is the cheapest platinum-group metal and its amount in the catalyst is only 3.58 wt.%, showing the catalyst high activity at a very competitive price. Density functional theory calculations reveal that the introduction of ruthenium atoms into cobalt core can improve the efficiency of electron transfer from alloy core to graphene shell, beneficial for enhancing carbon–hydrogen bond, thereby lowing ΔGH* of HER.

Date: 2017
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DOI: 10.1038/ncomms14969

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