A novel sea urchin like nanostructure as a bifunctional catalyst for overall water splitting

Abstract

The aim of this study is to construct a high-activity platinum-anchored WO3 electrocatalyst and investigate the effect of platinum content on the catalytic performance. This strategy compared the electrocatalytic performance under acidic conditions by discussing the platinum content and significantly enhances the electrocatalytic activity through nanoscale structure creation and electronic synergies. Therefore, anchoring Pt atoms on WO3 nanoarrays is very important for boosting the activity and stability of electrocatalysis via a hydrothermal co-precipitation approach, Ptx/WO3@NF (x = 0.1 mmol∼0.3 mmol) named as Pt1/WO3, Pt2/WO3 and Pt3/WO3, which enhanced hydrogen evolution reaction(HER) and oxygen evolution reaction (OER) activities. The prepared Pt2/WO3@NF microspheres showed excellent electrocatalytic activity. When the current density was 10 mA cm−2, the HER overpotential was 77 mV, the OER overpotential was 126 mV, and the two-electrode water decomposition voltage was 1.4418 V. The bifunctional catalyst shows excellent stability, with virtually no decay in the curves after 100 h stability tests. In addition, nanosheet surface has abundant defects and interface structure, which can maintain excellent conductivity of catalyst and expose more active sites clarify the increased H2 adsorption for HER activity enhancement. The synthesis of a bifunctional electrocatalyst with both HER and OER properties, presents a novel and intriguing concept that contributes to the advancement of green hydrogen development.