H_(2)O_(2) treatment boosts activity of NiFe layered double hydroxide for electro-catalytic oxidation of urea

Urea oxidation reaction(UOR)provides a method for hydrogen production besides wastewater treatment,but the current limited catalytic activity has prevented the application.Herein,we develop a novel H_(2)O_(2) treatment strategy for tailoring the surface oxygen ligand of NiFe-layered double hydroxides(NiFe-LDH).The sample after H_(2)O_(2) treatment(NiFeOLDH)shows significant enhancement on UOR efficiency,with the potential of 1.37 V(RHE)to reach a current density of 10 mA/cm^(2).The boost is attributed to the richness adsorption O ligand on NiFeO-LDH as revealed by XPS and Raman analysis.DFT calculation indicates formation of two possible types of oxygen ligands:adsorbed oxygen on the surface and exposed from hydroxyl group,lowered the desorption energy of CO_(2) product,which lead to the lowered onset potential.This strategy is further extended to NiFe-LDH nano sheet on Ni foam to reach a higher current density of 440 mA/cm^(2) of UOR at 1.8 V(RHE).The facile surface O ligand manipulation is also expected to give chance to many other electro-catalytic oxidations.