Al2Pt for Oxygen Evolution in Water Splitting: a Strategy for Creating Multi-functionality in Electrocatalysis.

: The production of hydrogen via water electrolysis is feasible only if effective and stable catalysts for the oxygen evolution reaction (OER) are available. Intermetallic compounds with the well-defined crystal and electronic structures as well as particular chemical bonding features are suggested here to act as precursors for new composite materials with attractive catalytic properties. Al 2 Pt combines a characteristic inorganic crystal structure (anti-fluorite type) and a strongly polar chemical bonding with the advantage of elemental platinum in terms of stability against dissolution under OER conditions. We describe here the unforeseen performance of a surface nanocomposite architecture resulting from the self-organized transformation of the bulk intermetallic precursor Al 2 Pt in OER.