Hierarchical NiCo 2 O 4 /NiFe/Pt heterostructures supported on nickel foam as bifunctional electrocatalysts for efficient oxygen/hydrogen production.

As the demand for clean and renewable energy increases, high-efficiency multifunctional electrocatalysts for water cracking have become a research hotspot. In this study, a NiCo 2 O 4 /NiFe/Pt composite with a hierarchical structure was successfully constructed by combining a hydrothermal growth and electrodeposition method with nickel foam as the scaffold material, and its overall water cracking reaction was studied. The laminar-structured NiCo 2 O 4 /NiFe composite exhibits an improved number of electrochemically active sites and shorter electron transport pathways, while the Pt particles deposited on the NiCo 2 O 4 /NiFe composite are conducive to improve the hydrogen evolution reaction without affecting the efficiency of the oxygen evolution reaction of the intrinsic material. The NiCo 2 O 4 /NiFe/Pt composite shows an excellent overall water cracking performance under alkaline conditions with a current density of 10 mA cm -2 at an applied potential of 1.45 V, indicating a promising research prospect.