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Interface Ru Active Centers to Promote Oxygen Evolution Reaction in Acid Electrolyte

Jun 01, 2020

Hydrogen is a clean, efficient and renewable green energy source. Acidic water electrolysis based on the proton exchange membrane is considered as one of the most promising technologies for continuous production of high-purity hydrogen. 

So far, RuO2 is one of the very few catalysts that can catalyze the anode oxygen evolution reaction (OER) in acidic water electrolysis. However, its practical application is largely hindered by both the high reaction overpotential and severe electrochemical corrosion of the active centers. 

A research group led by Prof. DENG Dehui from the Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics (DICP) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) constructed robust interface Ru centers between RuO2 and graphene, which provided a new strategy for designing highly active and stable OER catalyst. 

The researchers innovated the preparation strategy to construct robust interface Ru centers between RuO2 and graphene via a controllable oxidation of graphene encapsulating Ru nanoparticles to efficiently enhance both activity and stability of the acidic OER. 

Through precisely controlling the reaction interface, a much lower OER overpotential of 227 mV at 10 mA/cm2 in acidic electrolyte compared with that of 290 mV for commercial RuO2 was achieved. And a higher durability than that of commercial RuO2 was realized.  

Besides, cooperating with Dr. REN Pengju from the Institute of Coal Chemistry of CAS on density functional theory calculations, they demonstrated that the interface Ru centers between RuO2 and graphene could break the classic scaling relationships between the free energies of HOO* and HO* to reduce the limiting potential. This rendered an enhancement in the intrinsic OER activity and the resistance to over-oxidation and corrosion for RuO2. 

The study was published in Advanced Materials. 

 

Interface Ru active centers for high-efficiency oxygen evolution reaction. (Image by CUI Xiaoju and GAO Hehua)  

Contact

WANG Yongjin

Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics

E-mail:

Robust Interface Ru Centers for High‐Performance Acidic Oxygen Evolution

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