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Quaternary pyrite-structured nickel/cobalt phosphosulfide nanowires on carbon cloth as efficient and robust electrodes for water electrolysis

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Abstract

The strategy of element substitution is an effective way to tune the electronic structures of the active sites in catalysts, thereby leading to improvements in both the catalytic activity and stability. Herein, we design and synthesize pyrite-type nickel/phosphorus co-doped CoS2 nanowires on carbon cloth (NiCoPS/CC) as efficient and durable electrodes for water electrolysis. Introduction of nickel and phosphorus produced stepwise and superb enhancement of the performance of the electrodes in the hydrogen evolution reaction due to regulation of the electronic structures of the active sites of the catalyst and accelerated charge transfer over a wide pH range (0−14). The NiCoPS/CC electrodes also delivered a nearly undecayed catalytic current density of 10 mA·cm−2 at a low overpotential of 230 mV for oxygen evolution due to in situ formation of surficial Ni–Co oxo/hydroxide in 1.0 M KOH. Thus, the NiCoPS/CC electrodes gave rise to a catalytic current density of 10 mA·cm−2 for overall water splitting at potentials as low as 1.54 V during operation over 100 h in 1.0 M KOH with a Faradic efficiency of ~100%.

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Acknowledgements

We acknowledge the financial support from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 21401148), National 1000-Plan program and Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (Nos. xjj2013102, xjj2013043, and xjj2014064).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Center for Applied Chemical Research, Frontier Institute of Science and Technology, and State Key Laboratory for Mechanical Behavior of Materials, Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi’an, 710049, China

    Jiayuan Li, Zhaoming Xia, Xuemei Zhou, Yuanbin Qin, Yuanyuan Ma & Yongquan Qu

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  1. Jiayuan Li
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Correspondence to Yongquan Qu.

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Quaternary pyrite-structured nickel/cobalt phosphosulfide nanowires on carbon cloth as efficient and robust electrodes for water electrolysis

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Li, J., Xia, Z., Zhou, X. et al. Quaternary pyrite-structured nickel/cobalt phosphosulfide nanowires on carbon cloth as efficient and robust electrodes for water electrolysis. Nano Res. 10, 814–825 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12274-016-1335-z

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