Boosting electrocatalytic water splitting via metal-metalloid combined modulation in quaternary Ni-Fe-P-B amorphous compound

Abstract

Design and synthesis of highly efficient and cost-effective bifunctional catalysts for hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) and oxygen evolution reaction (OER) remain a big challenge. Herein, a quaternary amorphous nanocompound Ni-Fe-P-B has been synthesized by a facile, scalable co-reduction method. The Ni-Fe-P-B exhibits high electrocatalytic activity and outstanding durability for both HER and OER, delivering a current density of 10 mAcm−2 at overpotentials of 220 and 269 mV, respectively. When loaded on carbon fiber paper (CFP) as a bifunctional catalyst, the Ni-Fe-P-B@CFP electrode requires a low cell voltage of 1.58 V to obtain 10 mAcm−2 for overall water splitting with negligible recession over 60 h. The excellent catalytic performances of Ni-Fe-P-B mainly benefit from the metal-metalloid combined composition modulation and the unique amorphous structure. This work provides new insights into the design of robust bifunctional catalysts for water splitting, and may promote the development of multicomponent amorphous catalysts.