Hierarchically structured graphene-carbon nanotube-cobalt hybrid electrocatalyst for seawater battery

The design of cost-effective and highly active catalysts is a critical challenge. Inspired by the strong points of stability and conductivity of carbon nanotubes (CNTs), high catalytic activity of Co nanoparticles, and rapid ion diffusion and large accessible area of three-dimensional (3D) graphene, we demonstrate a novel strategy to construct a hierarchical hybrid structure consisting of Co/CoO_x nanoparticles-incorporated CNT branches onto the 3D reduced graphene oxide (rGO) architecture. The surface-modified 3D rGO by steam activation process has a large surface area and abundant defect sites, which serve as active sites to uniformly grow Co/CoO_x nanoparticles. Furthermore, the CNTs preserve their performance stably by encapsulating Co nanoparticles, while the uniformly decorated Co/CoO_x nanoparticles exhibit superior electrocatalytic activity toward oxygen evolution/reduction reaction due to highly exposed active sites. Employing the hybrid particle electrocatalyst, the seawater battery operates stably at 0.01 mA cm⁻² during 50 cycles, owing to the good electrocatalytic ability.