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The Influence of Elastic Strain on Catalytic Activity in the Hydrogen Evolution Reaction
Author(s) -
Yan Kai,
Maark Tuhina Adit,
Khorshidi Alireza,
Sethuraman Vijay A.,
Peterson Andrew A.,
Guduru Pradeep R.
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
angewandte chemie
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 1521-3757
pISSN - 0044-8249
DOI - 10.1002/ange.201508613
Subject(s) - catalysis , strain (injury) , reactivity (psychology) , tension (geology) , hydrogen , materials science , chemistry , ligand (biochemistry) , strain rate , chemical physics , compression (physics) , composite material , organic chemistry , medicine , biochemistry , alternative medicine , receptor , pathology
Abstract Understanding the role of elastic strain in modifying catalytic reaction rates is crucial for catalyst design, but experimentally, this effect is often coupled with a ligand effect. To isolate the strain effect, we have investigated the influence of externally applied elastic strain on the catalytic activity of metal films in the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER). We show that elastic strain tunes the catalytic activity in a controlled and predictable way. Both theory and experiment show strain controls reactivity in a controlled manner consistent with the qualitative predictions of the HER volcano plot and the d‐band theory: Ni and Pt's activities were accelerated by compression, while Cu's activity was accelerated by tension. By isolating the elastic strain effect from the ligand effect, this study provides a greater insight into the role of elastic strain in controlling electrocatalytic activity.