Issue 34, 2022

Methane plasma-mediated phase engineering of Ni nanosheets for alkaline hydrogen evolution

Abstract

Engineering of the crystal structures of metallic nanomaterials is an alternative avenue to control the size and shape of nanocatalysts. However, the phase-controlled synthesis of Ni nanocatalysts is challenging because of its low reduction potential under mild conditions. We developed a room-temperature CH4 plasma conversion of Ni(OH)2 nanosheets to hexagonal close packed (hcp) Ni while maintaining a pristine shape. Increasing the temperature resulted in the formation of face-centered cubic (fcc) Ni. The hcp Ni nanosheets exhibited an overpotential of 85 mV at 10 mA cm−2 for an electrocatalytic hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) in alkaline solution, which was superior to that of the fcc (122 mV) counterpart. Density-functional-theory calculations demonstrated that during the HER, the d-band center of hcp Ni was closer to the Fermi level, which aided the formation of H2 molecules. This work could facilitate the synthesis of other metastable metals and metallic alloys with high efficiency for various applications.

Graphical abstract: Methane plasma-mediated phase engineering of Ni nanosheets for alkaline hydrogen evolution

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
19 Mar 2022
Accepted
11 Jul 2022
First published
12 Jul 2022

Nanoscale, 2022,14, 12275-12280

Methane plasma-mediated phase engineering of Ni nanosheets for alkaline hydrogen evolution

W. Yan, C. An, Y. Shen, S. Zeng and C. An, Nanoscale, 2022, 14, 12275 DOI: 10.1039/D2NR01525K

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