Construction of Ru/MnO–Mn7C3/N-doped carbon sheets for boosting electrocatalytic hydrogen generation

Suffering from their low conductivity, Mn-base oxides are commonly inactive in H–OH activation. Generally, tailoring the coordinate environment of materials could induce variation in the atomic arrangement and further influence their chemical activity. Herein, we propose a feasible strategy to mediate the electronic structure of Mn-based oxides by facile hydrothermal method and thermal reduction route. Compared with MnO 2 sheets, the as-synthesized Ru/MnO–Mn 7 C 3 /N-doped carbon sheets (Ru/MnO–Mn 7 C 3 /NC) exhibit the higher activity for both acidic (73 mV) and alkaline water reduction reaction (44 mV@10 mA/cm 2 ). Benefitting from unique structures, Ru/MnO–Mn 7 C 3 /NC sheets show the better freshwater/seawater oxidation reactivity, exceeding RuO 2 . The strong interaction of MnO–Mn 7 C 3 heterostructures, Ru, and N-doped carbon endows Ru/MnO–Mn 7 C 3 /NC with the good freshwater and seawater dissociation performance, outperforming most of the reported Mn-based oxides.