Synthesis of FeOOH scaly hollow tubes based on Cu2O wire templates toward high-efficiency oxygen evolution reaction

For catalytic materials, the characteristics of one-dimension and hollowness are the promotion factors for their full presentation of catalytic activity, and through a template-assisted method, both above superiorities can be fused simultaneously. Here, we proposed a novel strategy inspired by Pearson’s principle with Cu 2 O wires as templates, and prepared FeOOH hollow tubes, which covered by FeOOH scales. When applied as oxygen evolution reaction (OER) catalyst, the FeOOH scaly hollow tubes (FeOOH SHTs) showed outstanding catalytic activity with a low overpotential of 245 mV to drive a current density of 10 mA·cm −2 , excellent kinetics manifesting as a low Tafel slope of 46.9 mV·dec −1 , and robust stability. This work provides a new synthesis strategy for an ideal OER catalyst, FeOOH, with high inherent activity and enhances the feasibility to broaden the design ideas of transition metal-based catalysts. Graphical abstract