Protonation Enables Durable and Efficient Water Oxidation on Commercial TiO<sub>2</sub>/IrO<sub>2</sub>
The oxygen evolution reaction (OER) performance of commercial TiO<sub>2</sub>-supported IrO<sub>2</sub> (IrO<sub>2</sub>/TiO<sub>2</sub>) suffers from the high electron transfer barriers at the IrO<sub>2</sub>/TiO<sub>2</sub> interface. Herein, we develop a cathodic polarization strategy to protonate TiO<sub>2</sub> (p-TiO<sub>2</sub>) in a commercial IrO<sub>2</sub>/TiO<sub>2</sub> catalyst. The high-density Ti<sup>3+</sup>-OH polaronic states on the surface of protonated TiO<sub>2</sub> greatly contribute to the decrease in the electron transfer barriers at the IrO<sub>2</sub>/TiO<sub>2</sub> interface. As a result, the IrO<sub>2</sub>/p-TiO<sub>2</sub> catalyst exhibits an ultralow overpotential of 246 ± 3 mV at 10 mA/cm<sup>2</sup> and durability over 200 h, attributed to electron compensation from Ti<sup>3+</sup>-OH states suppressing active Ir overoxidation. This electrochemical modification, requiring neither a complex apparatus nor high-temperature processing, establishes a new paradigm for designing high-performance anode catalysts.
Authors
- Shicheng Yan (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3432-9117)
- Zhigang Zou (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2092-8335)
- Da Wei Huang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6793-9966)
- Hongqiao Hu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8175-5648)
- Yu Du (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0004-0427-1366)
Institutions
- Collaborative Innovation Center of Advanced Microstructures (CN)
- Nanjing University (CN)
Publication Details
- Journal
- The Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters
- Published
- 2025-09-10
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.jpclett.5c02227
- Citations
- 1
- Primary Topic
- Electrocatalysts for Energy Conversion
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 0.36