Molten salt-induced vertical CoP/Co nanosheets array coupled with carbon for efficient water splitting

The exploration of high-efficiency non-noble metal catalysts for improving the intrinsic activity and active sites for overall water splitting persists as a bottleneck issue. Herein, a facile heterogeneous molten salt strategy has been proposed to fabricate CoP/Co nanosheets array that is vertically attached to a carbon matrix. Such a hierarchical structure endows the hybrid with abundant active sites and favorable reaction kinetics. Experimental results reveal that the molten salt determines the final shape of metallic Co, which is not sensitive to the organic sources. After optimization of the molten salt mass, the CoP/Co/C-6 shows the best bifunctional performance, requiring an overpotential of 132 mV and 320 mV at 10 mA cm-2 for hydrogen evolution reaction and oxygen evolution reaction, respectively. Theoretical simulation results manifest the CoP/Co heterostructure alters the electronic structure of Co and CoP, and reduces the adsorption free energy of intermediates, thus further boosting the electrocatalysis activity. This work proposes a molten salt-assisted method for the rational design of novel two-dimensional nano-hybrids for energy conversion applications.