Lattice Oxygen Activation through Deep Oxidation of Co 4 N by Jahn–Teller–Active Dopants for Improved Electrocatalytic Oxygen Evolution

Abstract Triggering the lattice oxygen oxidation mechanism is crucial for improving oxygen evolution reaction (OER) performance, because it could bypass the scaling relation limitation associated with the conventional adsorbate evolution mechanism through the direct formation of oxygen–oxygen bond. High‐valence transition metal sites are favorable for activating the lattice oxygen, but the deep oxidation of pre‐catalysts suffers from a high thermodynamic barrier. Here, taking advantage of the Jahn–Teller (J–T) distortion induced structural instability, we incorporate high‐spin Mn 3+ ( ) dopant into Co 4 N. Mn dopants enable a surface structural transformation from Co 4 N to CoOOH, and finally to CoO 2 , as…

• NN
  National Natural Science Foundation of China

  Award: 52204320
• NK
  National Key Research and Development Program of China

  Award: 2023YFA1507903