Sekar Sankar, Sim Dae Hyun, Lee Sejoon
Department of Semiconductor Science, Dongguk University-Seoul, Seoul 04620, Korea.
Quantum-Functional Semiconductor Research Center, Dongguk University-Seoul, Seoul 04620, Korea.
Nanomaterials (Basel). 2022 Feb 3;12(3):531. doi: 10.3390/nano12030531.
Carbonaceous materials play a vital role as an appropriate catalyst for electrocatalytic hydrogen production. Aiming at realizing the highly efficient hydrogen evolution reaction (HER), the partially graphitized activated-carbon nanobundles were synthesized as a high-performance HER electrocatalyst by using biomass human hair ashes through the high-temperature KOH activation at two different temperatures of 600 and 700 °C. Due to the partial graphitization, the 700 °C KOH-activated partially graphitized activated-carbon nanobundles exhibited higher electrical conductivity as well as higher textural porosity than those of the amorphous activated-carbon nanobundles that had been prepared by the KOH activation at 600 °C. As a consequence, the 700 °C-activated partially graphitized activated-carbon nanobundles showed the extraordinarily high HER activity with the very low overpotential (≈16 mV at 10 mA/cm in 0.5 M HSO) and the small Tafel slope (≈51 mV/dec). These results suggest that the human hair-derived partially graphitized activated-carbon nanobundles can be effectively utilized as a high-performance HER electrocatalyst in future hydrogen-energy technology.
碳质材料作为一种适用于电催化制氢的催化剂发挥着至关重要的作用。为了实现高效析氢反应（HER），通过在600和700℃这两个不同温度下进行高温KOH活化，以生物质人发灰为原料合成了部分石墨化的活性炭纳米束作为高性能HER电催化剂。由于部分石墨化，700℃ KOH活化的部分石墨化活性炭纳米束比600℃ KOH活化制备的无定形活性炭纳米束表现出更高的电导率和更高的结构孔隙率。因此，700℃活化的部分石墨化活性炭纳米束表现出极高的HER活性，过电位极低（在0.5 M H₂SO₄中10 mA/cm²时约为16 mV）且塔菲尔斜率较小（约51 mV/dec）。这些结果表明，人发衍生的部分石墨化活性炭纳米束在未来氢能技术中可有效用作高性能HER电催化剂。
