Rational Design of Atomic Layers of Pt Anchored on Mo2 C Nanorods for Efficient Hydrogen Evolution over a Wide pH Range

Yu Qiu; Zhilin Wen; Chaoran Jiang; Xiaojun Wu; Rui Si; Jun Bao; Qinghua Zhang; Lin Gu; Junwang Tang; Xiaohui Guo

doi:10.1002/smll.201900014

Rational Design of Atomic Layers of Pt Anchored on Mo₂ C Nanorods for Efficient Hydrogen Evolution over a Wide pH Range

Small. 2019 Apr;15(14):e1900014. doi: 10.1002/smll.201900014. Epub 2019 Mar 5.

Authors

Yu Qiu¹, Zhilin Wen², Chaoran Jiang³, Xiaojun Wu², Rui Si⁴, Jun Bao⁵, Qinghua Zhang⁶, Lin Gu⁶, Junwang Tang³, Xiaohui Guo¹

Affiliations

¹ Key Lab of Synthetic and Natural Functional Molecule Chemistry of Ministry of Education, and the College of Chemistry and Materials Science of Northwest University, Xi'an, 710069, P. R. China.
² Hefei National Laboratory of Physical Sciences at the Microscale, School of Chemistry of Materials Sciences, Synergetic Innovation of Quantum Information & Quantum Technology, CAS Key Lab of Materials for Energy Conversion, and CAS Excellent Center in Nanoscience, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230026, P. R. China.
³ Department of Chemical Engineering, UCL, Torrington Place, London, WC1E 7JE, UK.
⁴ Shanghai Synchrotron Radiation Facility, Shanghai Institute of Applied Physics, Chinese Academy of Science, Shanghai, 201800, P. R. China.
⁵ National Synchrotron Radiation Laboratory, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230029, P. R. China.
⁶ Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100190, P. R. China.

PMID: 30838758
DOI: 10.1002/smll.201900014

Abstract

Transition metal carbide compound has been extensively investigated as a catalyst for hydrogenation, for example, due to its noble metal-like properties. Herein a facile synthetic strategy is applied to control the thickness of atomic-layer Pt clusters strongly anchored on N-doped Mo₂ C nanorods (Pt/N-Mo₂ C) and it is found that the Pt atomic layers modify Mo₂ C function as a high-performance and robust catalyst for hydrogen evolution. The optimized 1.08 wt% Pt/N-Mo₂ C exhibits 25-fold, 10-fold, and 15-fold better mass activity than the benchmark 20 wt% Pt/C in neutral, acidic, and alkaline media, respectively. This catalyst also represents an extremely low overpotential of -8.3 mV at current density of 10 mA cm^-2 , much better than the majority of reported electrocatalysts and even the commercial reference catalyst (20 wt%) Pt/C. Furthermore, it exhibits an outstanding long-term operational durability of 120 h. Theoretical calculation predicts that the ultrathin layer of Pt clusters on Mo-Mo₂ C yields the lowest absolute value of ΔG_H* . Experimental results demonstrate that the atomic layer of Pt clusters anchored on Mo₂ C substrate greatly enhances electron and mass transportation efficiency and structural stability. These findings could provide the foundation for developing highly effective and scalable hydrogen evolution catalysts.

Keywords: Mo2C; Pt; activity; catalyst; hydrogen evolution.

Abstract

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