Electrochemical Oxidation of Chlorine-Doped Co(OH)2 Nanosheet Arrays on Carbon Cloth as a Bifunctional Oxygen Electrode

• Published in: ACS applied materials & interfaces Vol. 10; no. 1; pp. 796 - 805
• Main Authors: Kou, Yue, Liu, Jie, Li, Yingbo, Qu, Shengxiang, Ma, Chao, Song, Zhishuang, Han, Xiaopeng, Deng, Yida, Hu, Wenbin, Zhong, Cheng
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: American Chemical Society 10.01.2018
• Subjects: Co(OH)2; electrochemical oxidation; electrodeposition; chlorine; bifunctional electrocatalyst
• ISSN: 1944-8244; 1944-8252
• DOI: 10.1021/acsami.7b17002

The primary challenge of developing clean energy conversion/storage systems is to exploit an efficient bifunctional electrocatalyst both for oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) and oxygen evolution reaction (OER) with low cost and good durability. Here, we synthesized chlorine-doped Co­(OH)2 in situ grown on carbon cloth (Cl-doped Co­(OH)2) as an integrated electrode by a facial electrodeposition method. The anodic potential was then applied to the Cl-doped Co­(OH)2 in an alkaline solution to remove chlorine atoms (electro-oxidation (EO)/Cl-doped Co­(OH)2), which can further enhance the electrocatalytic activity without any thermal treatment. EO/Cl-doped Co­(OH)2 exhibits a better performance both for ORR and OER in terms of activity and durability because of the formation of a defective structure with a larger electrochemically active surface area after the electrochemical oxidation. This approach provides a new idea for introducing defects and developing active electrocatalyst.