Harbin Engineering University

About: Harbin Engineering University is a education organization based out in Harbin, Heilongjiang, China. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Control theory & Computer science. The organization has 31149 authors who have published 27940 publications receiving 276787 citations. The organization is also known as: HEU.

A heterogeneous interface on NiS@Ni3S2/NiMoO4 heterostructures for efficient urea electrolysis

Abstract: Urea electrolysis is an appealing energy conversion technology to produce hydrogen (H2) and alleviate the problem of urea-rich wastewater treatment concurrently. In particular, electrocatalytic performance can be dramatically enhanced by rationally modulating the surface charge distribution with a well-tuned heterostructure. Herein, a heterostructure is constructed by NiMoO4 nanosheets grown on an interior hollow NiS@Ni3S2 nanorods framework (NiS@Ni3S2/NiMoO4). Density functional theory (DFT) calculations demonstrate that the formed heterojunction structure leads to a tailored surface charge state of NiMoO4, with oxygen as the nucleophilic region and molybdenum as the electrophilic region, which facilitates the decomposition of urea molecules and thus significantly improves hydrogen evolution. As expected, the assembled NiS@Ni3S2/NiMoO4 system substantially expedites urea electrolysis activity with a cell voltage of 1.40 V at 10 mA cm−2, which is 200 mV less than the voltage of an overall water splitting system.