title: Ultrastable nitrogen-doped carbon encapsulating molybdenum phosphide nanoparticles as highly efficient electrocatalyst for hydrogen generation.
abstract: There is a crucial demand for cost-effective hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) catalysts towards future renewable energy systems, and the development of such catalysts operating under all pH conditions still remains a challenging task. In this work, a one-step facile approach to synthesizing nitrogen-doped carbon encapsulating molybdenum phosphide nanoparticles (MoP NPs@NC) is introduced by using ammonium molybdate, ammonium dihydrogen phosphate and melamine as precursor. Benefitting from structural advantages, including ultrasmall nanoparticles, large exposed surface area and fast charge transfer, MoP NPs@NC exhibits excellent HER catalytic activities with small overpotentials at all pH values (j = 10 mA cm-2at η = 115, 136 and 80 mV in 0.5 M H2SO4, 1.0 M phosphate buffer solution and 1.0 M KOH, respectively.). Meanwhile, the high catalytic activities of MoP NPs@NC under both neutral and basic conditions have never been achieved before for molybdenum phosphide-based catalysts. Additionally, the encapsulation by N-doped carbon effectively prevents the MoP NPs from corrosion, exhibiting nearly unfading stability after 100 h testing in 0.5 M H2SO4. Thus, our work could pave a new avenue for unprecedented design and fabrication of novel low-cost metal phosphide electrocatalysts encapsulated by N-doped carbon.
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Advanced Technology for Materials Synthesis and Processing, Wuhan University of Technology, Wuhan 430070, P. R. China. msc@whut.edu.cn.
authors.forename: Zonghua
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Pu
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Advanced Technology for Materials Synthesis and Processing, Wuhan University of Technology, Wuhan 430070, P. R. China. msc@whut.edu.cn.
authors.forename: Ibrahim Saana
authors.initials: IS
authors.lastname: Amiinu
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Advanced Technology for Materials Synthesis and Processing, Wuhan University of Technology, Wuhan 430070, P. R. China. msc@whut.edu.cn.
authors.forename: Xiaobo
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Advanced Technology for Materials Synthesis and Processing, Wuhan University of Technology, Wuhan 430070, P. R. China. msc@whut.edu.cn.
authors.forename: Min
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Advanced Technology for Materials Synthesis and Processing, Wuhan University of Technology, Wuhan 430070, P. R. China. msc@whut.edu.cn.
authors.forename: Shichun
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Mu