Synergistic effect of Polydopamine incorporated Copper electrocatalyst by dopamine oxidation for efficient hydrogen production

Dohun Kim; Junghyun An; Subramani Surendran; Jaehyoung Lim; Hui-Yun Jeong; Sejin Im; Joon Young Kim; Ki Tae Nam; Uk Sim

doi:10.1016/j.jcis.2023.06.184

Synergistic effect of Polydopamine incorporated Copper electrocatalyst by dopamine oxidation for efficient hydrogen production

J Colloid Interface Sci. 2023 Nov 15;650(Pt B):1406-1414. doi: 10.1016/j.jcis.2023.06.184. Epub 2023 Jun 28.

Authors

Dohun Kim¹, Junghyun An², Subramani Surendran³, Jaehyoung Lim³, Hui-Yun Jeong⁴, Sejin Im³, Joon Young Kim³, Ki Tae Nam⁵, Uk Sim⁶

Affiliations

¹ Department of Energy Science & Engineering, Daegu Gyeongbuk Institute of Science & Technology (DGIST), Daegu 42988, Republic of Korea.
² Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Seoul National University, Seoul 08826, Republic of Korea; Material Development group, Corporate R&D Institute, Samsung Electro-Mechanics, Suwon, Republic of Korea.
³ Hydrogen Energy Technology Laboratory, Korea Institute of Energy Technology (KENTECH), 200 Hyeoksin-ro, Naju, Jeonnam 58330, Republic of Korea.
⁴ Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, CA, USA.
⁵ Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Seoul National University, Seoul 08826, Republic of Korea. Electronic address: nkitae@snu.ac.kr.
⁶ Hydrogen Energy Technology Laboratory, Korea Institute of Energy Technology (KENTECH), 200 Hyeoksin-ro, Naju, Jeonnam 58330, Republic of Korea. Electronic address: usim@kentech.ac.kr.

PMID: 37480655
DOI: 10.1016/j.jcis.2023.06.184

Abstract

Tuning the metal-support interaction in electrocatalysts has been proposed as a viable method for manipulating the electronic structure and catalytic activity. In this work, inspired by natural hydrogenase enzyme, electrocatalysts with a hybrid metal-matrix complex using polydopamine (PDA) as a supporting matrix were synthesized for efficient green hydrogen production. Among the various Metal-PDA electrocatalysts, Cu-PDA shows outstanding catalytic activity (low overpotential (ƞ) of 104 mV at 10 mA cm^-2 and small Tafel slope of 60.67 mV dec^-1) with high stability at neutral pH. Also, the electrochemical impedance spectroscopy analysis verified the fast charge transfer properties of Cu-PDA (2.8 Ω cm²) than PDA (26 Ω cm²), indicating a faster proton-coupled electron transfer process in Cu-PDA electrocatalyst. Therefore, emerging nature inspired organic ligand-transition metal ion complexes can be extensively encouraged as a prospective HER electrocatalyst under neutral conditions.

Keywords: Biomimetic catalysts; Electrocatalyst; Hydrogen; Polydopamine; Renewable energy.