Regulating electronic structure of hollow LaxCoyO4@NC by La incorporation for electrochemical oxygen evolution reaction

Developing efficient and low-cost electrocatalysts to substitute noble metals is crucial for oxygen evolution reaction (OER). Herein, we successfully synthesized hollow porous La-doped Co 3 O 4 dodecahedral nanoparticles (La x Co y O 4 @NC) through using ZIF-67 as precursor. Wherein, La could regulate electronic structure of Co 3 O 4 and thus promotes the OER performance efficiently. La doped Co 3 O 4 displays enhanced OER activity than pure Co 3 O 4 , as confirmed by experience results and density functional theory (DFT) calculation. Due to La doping, the ratio of Co 2+ and Co 3+ would increase obviously and generate new electronic states near the Fermi level. The La 0.17 Co 2.83 O 4 @NC exhibites excellent OER performance and high durability, which only requires an overpotential of 363 mV at the current density of 10 mA·cm −2 in alkaline medium and markedly outperforms Co 3 O 4 @NC (414 mV). These findings might provide a new strategy for controllable synthesis of transition metal nanocatalysts for high-performance OER electrocatalysis.