Boosting water oxidation on metal-free carbon nanotubes via directional interfacial charge-transfer induced by an adsorbed polyelectrolyte. Issue 12 (11th July 2018)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Mo, Chunshao; Jian, Junhua; Li, Jing; Fang, Zhengsong; Zhao, Zhe; Yuan, Zhongke; Yang, Meijia; Zhang, You; Dai, Liming; Yu, Dingshan
• Is Part Of: Energy & environmental science. Volume 11:Issue 12(2018)
• Page Start: 3334
• Page End: 3341
• Publication Date: 2018-07-11
• Subjects: Energy conversion -- Periodicals; Fuel switching -- Periodicals; Environmental sciences -- Periodicals; Environmental chemistry -- Periodicals; 333.79
• DOI: 10.1039/c8ee01487f
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1754-5692

Abstract

Abstract : Directional interfacial charge transfer doping was used to significantly boost the water oxidation performance of pure carbon nanotubes. Abstract : Engineering the surface and electronic structures of nanocarbons is a viable strategy to boost their catalytic performance. Herein, rather than conventional covalent doping, we used the concept of interfacial charge transfer doping of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) to noncovalently adsorb certain polyelectrolytes ( i.e. poly(diallyldimethylammonium chloride), PDDA, acceptor) onto pure CNTs (donor) to act as a buffer layer for richening reactants (OH − ) via electrostatic interaction and to induce notable interfacial charge redistribution via directional intermolecular charge-transfer, which not only improves the reaction kinetics but also creates a high density of catalytic carbon sites, eventually transforming the inactive CNTs into efficient metal-free water oxidation catalysts. As expected, the resulting PDDA-adsorbed CNT catalysts yielded a remarkably lower overpotential of 370 mV at 10.0 mA cm −2 with a smaller Tafel slope of 76 mV dec −1 with respect to pure CNTs (>520 mV, 166 mV dec −1 ), even on a par with the benchmark RuO2 (360 mV, 137 mV dec −1 ) in 0.1 M KOH.