title: Surface Roughening of Nickel Cobalt Phosphide Nanowire Arrays/Ni Foam for Enhanced Hydrogen Evolution Activity.
abstract: Development of earth-abundant, efficient, and stable electrocatalysts for hydrogen evolution reactions (HER) in alkaline or even neutral pH electrolyte is very important for hydrogen production from water splitting. Construction of bimetal phosphides via tuning the bonding strength to hydrogen and increasing effective active sites through nanostructuring and surface engineering should lead to high HER activity. Here, ternary NiCoP nanowires (NWs) decorated by homogeneous nanoparticles have been obtained on Ni foam for a highly efficient HER property via long-term cyclic voltammetric (CV) sweeping. The electron density transfer between the positively charged Ni and Co and negatively charged P atoms, one-dimensional electron transfer channel of the NWs, and abundant active sites supplied by the nanoparticles and NWs endow the catalyst with low overpotentials of 43 and 118 mV to achieve the respective current densities of 10 and 100 mA cm-2together with long durability for at least 33 h in 1 M KOH. A cycled anodic dissolution-redeposition mechanism is disclosed for the formation of the NiCoP nanoparticles during the CV sweeping process. Such a surface roughening method is found to be adaptable to enhance the HER property of other phosphides, including Ni2P nanoplates/NF, NiCoP nanoparticles/NF, and CoP NW/NF.
authors.affiliation: Hubei Collaborative Innovation Center for Advanced Organic Chemical Materials, Hubei Key Laboratory of Ferro & Piezoelectric Materials and Devices, Faculty of Physics and Electronic Science, Hubei University , Wuhan, Hubei 430062, P.R. China.
authors.forename: Xina
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: Hubei Collaborative Innovation Center for Advanced Organic Chemical Materials, Hubei Key Laboratory of Ferro & Piezoelectric Materials and Devices, Faculty of Physics and Electronic Science, Hubei University , Wuhan, Hubei 430062, P.R. China.
authors.forename: Rui
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Tong
authors.affiliation: Stuttgart Center for Electron Microscopy, Max Planck Institute for Solid State Research , Heisenbergstrasse 1, 70569 Stuttgart, Germany.
authors.forename: Yi
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: Liaoning Key Materials Laboratory for Railway, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Dalian Jiaotong University , Dalian 116028, P.R. China.
authors.forename: Hualong
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Tao
authors.affiliation: Liaoning Key Materials Laboratory for Railway, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Dalian Jiaotong University , Dalian 116028, P.R. China.
authors.forename: Zhihua
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.affiliation: Hubei Collaborative Innovation Center for Advanced Organic Chemical Materials, Hubei Key Laboratory of Ferro & Piezoelectric Materials and Devices, Faculty of Physics and Electronic Science, Hubei University , Wuhan, Hubei 430062, P.R. China.
authors.forename: Hao
authors.identifier: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-4894-7653
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Wang
keywords: CV sweeping; NiCoP; hydrogen evolution; nanowires; surface roughening