Metallic Mo, Ru coupled with graphitic carbon dots to activate inertness 1D copper-based nanowires as efficient electrocatalyst for pH-universal hydrogen evolution reaction

Designing efficient and robust pH-universal electrocatalysts for hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) is the key to boost the development of eco-friendly hydrogen energy. Herein, metallic Mo, Ru coupled with graphitic carbon dots (GQDs) activate inertness 1D copper-based nanowires (GQDs@ Ru, Mo-Cu2O/CF) by surface chemical oxidation, solvothermal and low temperature calcination. The metals of Mo, Ru favor the water-dissociation and optimize the hydrogen adsorption/desorption. In addition, GQDs owns edge effect and good conductivity, and then benefiting electron transport and active sites exposure. Therefore, the synthesized GQDs@ Ru, Mo-Cu2O/CF requires only 30, 39, 17 and 55 mV in alkaline, acidic, alkaline seawater and neutral to achieve 10 mA cm−2. Moreover, the assembled electrolyzer requires 1.58 V to reach 10 mA cm−2 in alkaline seawater, and maintained well at 200 mA cm−2 for 100 h. This research opens a new avenue for designing efficient catalysts on energy-relation applications through introducing both metal and non-metal.