Bio-inspired synthesis of reduced graphene oxide wrapped Geobacter sulfurreducens as a hybrid electrocatalyst for efficient oxygen evolution reaction
Type
ArticleAuthors
Kalathil, ShafeerKaturi, Krishna
Alazmi, Amira
Pedireddy, Srikanth

Kornienko, Nikolay
Da Costa, Pedro M. F. J.

Saikaly, Pascal

KAUST Department
Biological and Environmental Sciences and Engineering (BESE) DivisionChemical Science Program
Environmental Biotechnology Research Group
Environmental Science and Engineering Program
KAUST Catalysis Center (KCC)
Material Science and Engineering Program
Physical Science and Engineering (PSE) Division
Water Desalination and Reuse Research Center (WDRC)
KAUST Grant Number
URF/1/2985-01-01Date
2019-04-17Online Publication Date
2019-04-17Print Publication Date
2019-05-28Permanent link to this record
http://hdl.handle.net/10754/631993
Metadata
Show full item recordAbstract
Doping/decorating of graphene or reduced graphene oxide (rGO) with heteroatoms provides a promising route for the development of electrocatalysts useful in many technologies, including water splitting. However, current doping approaches are complicated, not eco-friendly and not cost-effective. Herein, we report the synthesis of doped/decorated rGO for oxygen evolution reaction (OER) using a simple approach that is cost-effective, sustainable and easy to scale up. The OER catalyst was derived from the reduction of GO by an exo-electron transferring bacterium, Geobacter sulfurreducens. Various analytical tools indicate that OER active elements such as Fe, Cu, N, P, and S decorate the rGO flakes. The hybrid catalyst (i.e., Geobacter/rGO) produces a geometric current density of 10 mA cm−2 at an overpotential of 270 mV vs. the reversible hydrogen electrode (RHE) with a Tafel slope of 43 mV dec−1, and possesses high durability, evidenced through 10 hours of stability testing. Electrochemical analyses suggest the importance of Fe and its possible role as active site for OER. Overall, this work represents a simple approach towards the development of earth-abundant, eco-friendly and highly active OER electrocatalyst for various applications such as solar fuel production, rechargeable metal-air batteries, and microbial electrosynthesis.Citation
Kalathil S, Katuri KP, Alazmi AS, Pedireddy S, Kornienko N, et al. (2019) Bio-inspired synthesis of reduced graphene oxide wrapped Geobacter sulfurreducens as a hybrid electrocatalyst for efficient oxygen evolution reaction. Chemistry of Materials. Available: http://dx.doi.org/10.1021/acs.chemmater.9b00394.Sponsors
This work was supported by Competitive Research Grant (URF/1/2985-01-01) from King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST).Publisher
American Chemical Society (ACS)Journal
Chemistry of MaterialsAdditional Links
https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.chemmater.9b00394ae974a485f413a2113503eed53cd6c53
10.1021/acs.chemmater.9b00394