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Negative Charging of Transition‐Metal Phosphides via Strong Electronic Coupling for Destabilization of Alkaline Water
Author(s) -
You Bo,
Zhang Yadong,
Jiao Yan,
Davey Kenneth,
Qiao Shi Zhang
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
angewandte chemie international edition
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 5.831
H-Index - 550
eISSN - 1521-3773
pISSN - 1433-7851
DOI - 10.1002/anie.201906683
Subject(s) - overpotential , transition metal , electrocatalyst , nickel , dissociation (chemistry) , oxide , metal , chemistry , adsorption , inorganic chemistry , chemical physics , electronic structure , self ionization of water , materials science , electrochemistry , catalysis , electrode , computational chemistry , biochemistry , organic chemistry
Heterogeneous electrocatalysis typically involves charge transfer between surface active sites and adsorbed species. Therefore, modulating the surface charge state of an electrocatalyst can be used to enhance performance. A series of negatively charged transition‐metal (Fe, Co, Ni, Cu,and NiCo) phosphides were fabricated by designing strong electronic coupling with hydr(oxy)oxides formed in situ. Physicochemical characterizations, together with DFT computations, demonstrate that strong electronic coupling renders transition‐metal phosphides negatively charged. This facilitates destabilization of alkaline water adsorption and dissociation to result in significantly improved H 2 evolution. Negatively charged Ni 2 P/nickel hydr(oxy)oxide for example exhibits a significantly low overpotential of 138 mV at 100 mA cm −2 , superior to that without strong electronic coupling and also commercial Pt/C.