NiO and magnetic CuFe 2 O 4 -based composite electrocatalyst for enhanced oxygen evolution reaction

The biggest concerns confronting the modern world are the depletion of nonrenewable energy sources and rising global temperatures. The use of O 2 as an alternative energy source offers a potential answer to these problems. Low-cost electrocatalysts are growing approach for electrocatalytic water splitting, such as oxygen evolution reaction (OER). Oxygen evolution reactions are tremendously well-catalyzed by inexpensive transition metal oxide-based nanostructures. Here, we present a new composite NiO/CuFe 2 O 4 nanostructure and further investigate its potential for electrocatalytic OER applications. Microscopic and spectroscopic methods such as FE-SEM, XRD, XPS, and FTIR were utilized to explore the morphology and structural characteristics of the electrocatalyst. The composite NiO/CuFe 2 O 4 catalyst demonstrates excellent electrochemical OER accomplishment with the overpotential of 297 mV for an alkaline medium to acquire the current density of 10 mA/cm 2 and a low Tafel slope of 63 mV/dec −1 to confirm the faster reaction of the composite catalyst. The synergism between the metal ions Ni, Cu, and Fe makes the composite catalyst more efficient in its catalytic activity so; the as-prepared structure demonstrates higher electrocatalytic OER execution with cyclic stability and durability than its pristine constituents. The results show that the NiO/CuFe 2 O 4 composite has the potential to act as an electrocatalyst for the splitting of water.