Plasmon-enhanced hydrogen evolution on Pt-anchored titanium nitride nanowire arrays

An efficient catatlyst composed of non-noble TiN as a plasmonic booster and Pt nanoparticles (NPs) as a cocatalyst is prepared on carbon cloth (CC) (Pt/TiN/CC) by nitridation of TiO 2 in NH 3 and electrodeposition, respectively. Surface plasmon resonance (SPR) enhances the activity in the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) such as an overpotential of 16 mV at a current density of 10 mA cm −2 (η 10 ) as well as 2-fold decay in η 10 compared to the control experiment conducted in darkness (33 mV). • An efficient catatlyst comprising the non-noble TiN as a plasmonic booster and Pt nanoparticles is prepared on carbon cloth. • The synergetic effects rendered by TiN, and play vital roles in boosting the activity in HER. • Surface plasmon resonance (SPR) enhances the activity in the HER with an overpotential of 16 mV at a current density of 10 mA cm −2 . Plasmonic materials integrated with electrochemical catalysts produce hot carriers that improve the catalytic activity of the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER). Previous studies have mainly focused on noble metal-based plasmonic materials. Herein, an efficient catalyst comprising non-noble TiN as the plasmonic booster and Pt nanoparticles (NPs) as the cocatalyst is prepared on carbon cloth (CC) (Pt/TiN/CC) by nitridation of TiO 2 in NH 3 and electrodeposition. The HER properties are improved significantly as manifested by a small overpotential of 16 mV at a current density of 10 mA cm −2 (η 10 ) as well as 2-fold decay in η 10 compared to the control experiment conducted in darkness (33 mV). To investigate the role of light-excited hot electrons in the reduction of protons to H 2 , Pt/TiO x /CC is irradiated with UV–visible light in the control experiment and the superior characteristics of Pt/TiN/CC corroborate the surface plasmon resonance (SPR) enhancement rendered from the TiN nanowire arrays. This study provides a fundamental understanding of hot electronics generated by SPR and insights into the design of non-noble electrocatalysts for HER and other applications.