Edge-sharing RuO2 single layer for stable and low overpotential acidic water electrolysis
Wenxiang Zhu1,2,3, Jing Zhou4, Mengjie Ma2,5
1College of Chemistry, Chemical Engineering and Materials Science, Soochow University, Suzhou, China.
Abstract:
The acidic oxygen-evolution reaction is intrinsically sluggish and requires large overpotentials, creating a key bottleneck for proton-exchange membrane water electrolysis technology. Here we show an edge-sharing single-layer oxide, 1T-phase ruthenium oxide (1T-RuO2). The edge-sharing configuration enables parallel alignment of ruthenium 4d orbitals across adjacent RuO6 octahedral clusters, facilitating intersite electron transport, in contrast to conventional rutile-type RuO2 with corner-/edge-sharing structures. 1T-RuO2 exhibits high acidic oxygen-evolution reaction activity with a low overpotential of 77 mV at 10 mA cm-2. It also delivers a mass activity of and a turnover frequency of 23.99 s-1 at 1.50 V versus the reversible hydrogen electrode, exceeding those of rutile-RuO2 and showing highly competitive performance under the described experimental framework. In addition, 1T-RuO2 maintains a current density of ∼2.9 A cm-2 at a cell voltage of 1.70 V for over 1,100 h in a proton-exchange membrane water electrolyser.
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