{"title":"Mo doping with morphology regulation of Ni3S2 as efficient bifunctional electrocatalysts for urea-assisted hydrogen generation","authors":"Feng Jing, Zhen Liu, Bo Cheng, Sihan Fu, Zhiyi Wang, Hongying Mei, Kangwen Qiu","doi":"10.1007/s11243-025-00703-0","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>The integration of urea oxidation reaction (UOR) and hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) into urea electrolysis can concurrently accomplish energy-conserving hydrogen (H<sub>2</sub>) production and the treatment of urea-contaminated wastewater. Central to achieving this goal is the development of efficient and cost-effective bifunctional electrocatalysts. In this study, a novel one-pot green strategy was developed for the in-situ synthesis of molybdenum-doped Ni<sub>3</sub>S<sub>2</sub> nanorods on nickel foam (Mo-Ni<sub>3</sub>S<sub>2</sub>/NF), serving as an efficient bifunctional electrocatalyst for the UOR and HER. The incorporation of Mo effectively modulates both the morphological and electronic structure of Ni<sub>3</sub>S<sub>2</sub>, bringing a substantial increase in accessible active sites and a marked improvement in charge transfer efficiency. Notably, to deliver a current density of 10 mA cm<sup>-2</sup>, the Mo-Ni<sub>3</sub>S<sub>2</sub>/NF three-dimensional electrode requires merely 1.339 V (UOR) and 0.138 V (HER) when tested in 1.0 M KOH containing 0.5 M urea, underscoring its remarkable catalytic activity. Moreover, the Mo-Ni<sub>3</sub>S<sub>2</sub>/NF based urea electrolyzer attains 10 mA cm<sup>-2</sup> at merely 1.477 V and shows excellent durability over 48 h. Density functional theory (DFT) calculations indicate enhanced electron cloud density near the Fermi level relative to undoped Ni<sub>3</sub>S<sub>2</sub>, demonstrating that Mo doping improves both conductivity and carrier density. Our finding provides a new way to design efficient bifunctional catalysts for urea-assisted energy-efficiency H<sub>2</sub> production.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":803,"journal":{"name":"Transition Metal Chemistry","volume":"51 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.8000,"publicationDate":"2025-11-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Transition Metal Chemistry","FirstCategoryId":"92","ListUrlMain":"https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11243-025-00703-0","RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"化学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q3","JCRName":"CHEMISTRY, INORGANIC & NUCLEAR","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
The integration of urea oxidation reaction (UOR) and hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) into urea electrolysis can concurrently accomplish energy-conserving hydrogen (H2) production and the treatment of urea-contaminated wastewater. Central to achieving this goal is the development of efficient and cost-effective bifunctional electrocatalysts. In this study, a novel one-pot green strategy was developed for the in-situ synthesis of molybdenum-doped Ni3S2 nanorods on nickel foam (Mo-Ni3S2/NF), serving as an efficient bifunctional electrocatalyst for the UOR and HER. The incorporation of Mo effectively modulates both the morphological and electronic structure of Ni3S2, bringing a substantial increase in accessible active sites and a marked improvement in charge transfer efficiency. Notably, to deliver a current density of 10 mA cm-2, the Mo-Ni3S2/NF three-dimensional electrode requires merely 1.339 V (UOR) and 0.138 V (HER) when tested in 1.0 M KOH containing 0.5 M urea, underscoring its remarkable catalytic activity. Moreover, the Mo-Ni3S2/NF based urea electrolyzer attains 10 mA cm-2 at merely 1.477 V and shows excellent durability over 48 h. Density functional theory (DFT) calculations indicate enhanced electron cloud density near the Fermi level relative to undoped Ni3S2, demonstrating that Mo doping improves both conductivity and carrier density. Our finding provides a new way to design efficient bifunctional catalysts for urea-assisted energy-efficiency H2 production.
将尿素氧化反应(UOR)和析氢反应(HER)整合到尿素电解中,可以同时实现节能制氢和尿素污染废水的处理。实现这一目标的核心是开发高效和经济的双功能电催化剂。在本研究中,开发了一种新的一锅绿色策略,用于在泡沫镍上原位合成钼掺杂Ni3S2纳米棒(Mo-Ni3S2/NF),作为一种高效的双功能电催化剂用于UOR和HER。Mo的加入有效地调节了Ni3S2的形态和电子结构,使可达活性位点大幅增加,电荷转移效率显著提高。值得注意的是,在含有0.5 M尿素的1.0 M KOH中,Mo-Ni3S2/NF三维电极仅需要1.339 V (UOR)和0.138 V (HER),即可提供10 mA cm-2的电流密度,这表明其具有显著的催化活性。此外,基于Mo-Ni3S2/NF的尿素电解槽在1.477 V下达到10 mA cm-2,并且在48小时内具有出色的耐久性。密度功能理论(DFT)计算表明,相对于未掺杂的Ni3S2,在费米能级附近的电子云密度增强,表明Mo掺杂提高了电导率和载流子密度。我们的发现为设计高效的双功能催化剂用于尿素辅助高效制氢提供了新的途径。
期刊介绍:
Transition Metal Chemistry is an international journal designed to deal with all aspects of the subject embodied in the title: the preparation of transition metal-based molecular compounds of all kinds (including complexes of the Group 12 elements), their structural, physical, kinetic, catalytic and biological properties, their use in chemical synthesis as well as their application in the widest context, their role in naturally occurring systems etc.
Manuscripts submitted to the journal should be of broad appeal to the readership and for this reason, papers which are confined to more specialised studies such as the measurement of solution phase equilibria or thermal decomposition studies, or papers which include extensive material on f-block elements, or papers dealing with non-molecular materials, will not normally be considered for publication. Work describing new ligands or coordination geometries must provide sufficient evidence for the confident assignment of structural formulae; this will usually take the form of one or more X-ray crystal structures.