Heterostructure and Oxygen Vacancies Promote NiFe2O4/Ni3S4toward Oxygen Evolution Reaction and Zn-Air Batteries

作者：Fu, Zhaoqin; Liu, Shilong; Mai, Zequn; Tang, Zhenghua^*; Qin, Dong-Dong^*; Tian, Yong; Wang, Xiufang^*

来源：Chemistry - An Asian Journal, 2020, 15(21): 3568-3574.

DOI：10.1002/asia.202001033

• Heterostructure
• Oxygen vacancies
• NiFe2O4
• Ni(3)S(4)nanorods
• Oxygen evolution reaction
• Zinc-air batteries

Developing high-performance catalysts for oxygen evolution reaction (OER) is critical for the widespread applications of clean and sustainable energy through electrochemical devices such as zinc-air batteries and (photo)electrochemical water splitting. Constructing heterostructure and oxygen vacancies have demonstrated great promises to boost the OER performance. Herein, we report a facile strategy to fabricate hetero-structured NiFe2O4/Ni(3)S(4)nanorods, where NiFe(2)O(4)can be derived from Fe-based metal-organic frameworks (MOFs). The NiFe2O4/Ni(3)S(4)catalyst exhibited excellent OER performance, evidenced by an overpotential value of 357 mV at the current density of 20 mA cm(-2), and a small Tafel slope of 87.46 mV dec(-1)in 1 M KOH, superior to the benchmark IrO(2)catalyst. Moreover, NiFe2O4/Ni(3)S(4)outperformed with regard to long-term durability for OER than IrO2. Such outstanding OER performance is mainly accounted by the interface between NiFe(2)O(4)and Ni3S4, and the presence of rich oxygen vacancies. When employed as air-cathode in zinc-air batteries, the NiFe2O4/Ni(3)S(4)decorated battery had a high round-trip efficiency of 62.1% at 10 h, and possessed long-term stability of >50 h. This study may pave the way for fabricating non-noble-metal-based cost-effective, efficient and durable electrocatalysts for OER, zinc-air batteries, and beyond.

• 单位
  广东药学院; 广州大学