Hybrid Organic–Inorganic Gel Electrocatalyst for Stable Acidic Water Oxidation

Water oxidation catalysts (WOCs) are essential to electrochemical hydrogen production, but (electro)chemical instability remains a critical issue for WOCs especially under acidic conditions. Here we present a hybrid organic–inorganic polymeric dual network gel (DN gel) electrocatalyst based on earth-abundant elements via in situ oxidative polymerization of polypyrrole and simultaneous cyano-polymerization for efficient acidic water oxidation. X-ray absorption and X-ray photoelectron spectra reveal a synergistic interplay between the inorganic polymer and the organic conductive polymer in producing a favorable local coordination environment, further supported by the DFT calculation. The DN gel electrocatalyst exhibits highly active and stable catalytic activity for oxygen evolution in the pH = 0 electrolyte, with no noticeable degradation after more than 3000 cycles. This work presents an alternative insight into developing highly active and robust WOCs as promising alternatives to noble metal catalysts in...