MOF-derived Co, Ni, Mn co-doped N-enriched hollow carbon for efficient hydrogen evolution reaction catalysis

Abstract

Exploring highly active, durable, and low cost catalysts for hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) remains a significant challenge. As such, the present study provides a method to fabricate non-precious metal doped catalysts with exceptional HER performance. Co, Ni, and Mn co-doped N-enriched hollow carbon (CoNiMn/NC) was successfully fabricated by adopting ZIF-67 as a precursor using facile absorption, pyrolysis, and annealing processes. The fabricated CoNiMn/NC exhibited exceptional HER activity with a low overpotential of 191 ​mV ​at 10 ​mA ​cm−2, a small Tafel slope of 64.38 ​mV dec−1 and excellent long-term stability. The proficient HER performance of CoNiMn/NC can be attributed to the unique N-enriched hollow structure with excellent conductivity, which does not only provide abundant active sites, but also fixes metal Co, Ni, and Mn on the N-enriched hollow carbon.