The construction of stable Ru/RuO2 porous reticular heterostructure with highly efficient electrocatalytic activity for oxygen evolution reaction

Abstract A facile construction of Ru/RuO2 composite with porous reticular structure (denoted as Ru/RuO2-PRS) by controllable pyrolysis of Ru3+ coordinated cyanoguanidine was presented for oxygen evolution reaction (OER). The Ru/RuO2 heterostructure was identified in Ru/RuO2-PRS. Taking the advantages of the Ru/RuO2 heterostructure and large specific surface area, Ru/RuO2-PRS exhibits much more improved OER activity with much lower onset potential and overpotential to reach the current density of 10 mA cm−2 compared with RuO2 porous powder and RuO2 nano-particles counterparts in both acidic and alkaline solution. Specifically, Ru/RuO2-PRS exhibits much improved durability because the unique Ru/RuO2 heterostructure relieves the dissolution of RuO2 at high anodic potential that has been the bottleneck of Ru-based catalysts for OER, especially in acidic electrolyte. This study provides a new strategy to promote the OER application in acidic solution.