Regulating the electronic structure of cobalt phosphide via dual-metal doping engineering to trigger efficient hydrogen evolution

Abstract

Exploration of earth-abundant, low cost, and versatile catalysts with Pt-like performance for electrochemical water splitting holds practical significance for clean energy shortage and environmental pollution. However, manipulating the electronic structure and relevant physical properties of the catalysts is crucial in promoting their hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) performance but still a formidable challenge. In this work, we report a self-supported dual-metal doped on CoP3 nanowire arrays (NAs) and grown on carbon fiber cloth (Ni,Mn-CoP3 NAs) for alkaline HER. The optimized catalyst exhibits superior electrocatalytic activity, giving a low overpotential of 24 mV at 10 mA cm−2 with a small Tafel slope of 41 mV dec−1 and can sustain for 24 h, which is superior to the commercial Pt/C catalysts at a large current density. On the basis of systematic experiments and density functional theory calculations, the synergistic regulation of dual-metal doping can re-form the electronic structure so as to enhance the electrical conductivity, improve the intrinsic HER activity, and increase the electrochemical surface area of CoP3. This work points out avenues in the reasonable design and development of dual-metal doped transition-metal phosphides as highly active, durable, and economically viable catalysts for various catalytic reactions.