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Updated: Jun 30, 2026

Synthesis of Platinum-nickel Nanowires and Optimization for Oxygen Reduction Performance
Published on: April 27, 2018
Effectiveness of strain and dopants on breaking the activity-stability trade-off of RuO2 acidic oxygen evolution
Yang Liu1,2,3, Yixuan Wang2, Hao Li2
1Shandong Provincial Key Laboratory for Science of Material Creation and Energy Conversion, Institute of Frontier Chemistry, School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Shandong University, Qingdao, PR China.
Abstract:
Ruthenium dioxide electrocatalysts for acidic oxygen evolution reaction suffer from mediocre activity and rather instability induced by high ruthenium-oxygen covalency. Here, the tensile strained strontium and tantalum codoped ruthenium dioxide nanocatalysts are synthesized via a molten salt-assisted quenching strategy. The tensile strained spacially elongates the ruthenium-oxygen bond and reduces covalency, thereby inhibiting the lattice oxygen participation and structural decomposition. The synergistic electronic modulations among strontium-tantalum-ruthenium groups both optimize deprotonation on oxygen sites and intermediates absorption on ruthenium sites, lowering the reaction energy barrier. Those result in a well-balanced activity-stability profile, confirmed by comprehensive experimental and theoretical analyses. Our strained electrode demonstrates an overpotential of 166 mV at 10 mA cm-2 in 0.5 M H2SO4 and an order of magnitude higher S-number, indicating comparable stability compared to bare catalyst. It exhibits negligible degradation rates within the long-term operation of single cell and PEM electrolyzer. This study elucidates the effectiveness of tensile strain and strategic doping in enhancing the activity and stability of ruthenium-based catalysts for acidic oxygen evolution reactions.
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