Amorphous Manganese–Cobalt Nanosheets as Efficient Catalysts for Hydrogen Evolution Reaction (HER)

A facile and efficient electrocatalyst for hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) to produce hydrogen is very important for future energy. In this paper, amorphous manganese–cobalt nanosheets are successfully prepared by electrospinning on a foamed nickel substrate. It is found that the manganese (Mn) introduction in manganese–cobalt composites can simultaneously enhance their electrocatalytic performances. As a result, benefitting from the 3D structure, the self-supported Mn–Co hydroxides exhibits unprecedented HER activity with a relatively low overpotential of 100 mV at 10 mA cm −2 and has a possibility for the large-scale production of hydrogen. Graphic Abstract Amorphous PVP/Mn 4 Co nanofibers formed by electrospinning on Ni foam (NF) has remarkable catalytic activity and stability for HER after operation for 6 h in 1 M KOH, with a low overpotential of 0.1 V at 100 mA cm −2 , a low Tafel slope of 65.4 mV dec −1 .