Bifunctional metal phosphide FeMnP films from single source metal organic chemical vapor deposition for efficient overall water splitting

Developing stable and efficient bifunctional catalysts for overall water splitting into hydrogen and oxygen is a critical step in the realization of several clean-energy technologies. Here we report a robust and highly active electrocatalyst that is constructed by deposition of the ternary metal phosphide FeMnP onto graphene-protected nickel foam by metal-organic chemical vapor deposition from a single source precursor. FeMnP exhibits high electrocatalytic activity toward both the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) and the oxygen evolution reaction (OER). Utilizing FeMnP/GNF as both the anode and the cathode for overall water splitting, a current density of 10 mA cm−2 is achieved at a cell voltage of as low as 1.55 V with excellent stability. Complementary density functional theory (DFT) calculations suggest that facets exposing both Fe and Mn sites are necessary to achieve high HER activity. The present work provides a facile strategy for fabricating highly efficient electrocatalysts from earth-abundant materials for overall water splitting

Transition metal complexes of the naked pnictide elements

Even though transition metal compounds containing “naked” pnictide elements (E) have been known for many decades now, the chemistry of this interesting class of compounds continues to provide surprises and intellectual challenges in describing new structures and interesting bonding patterns. The number of ligand sets that now support naked pnictide ligands has expanded from the traditional organometallic ligand sets to include metal alkoxides and N-heterocyclic carbene species, and complexes are known from the early transition metals to the end of the d-block. In this review, complexes are presented based on their structural similarities starting with metal-rich compounds containing isolated E atoms in a variety of coordination environments presented in order of increasing metal connectivity. Subsequently, compounds possessing Ex fragments with x ranging from 2 to 24 are presented in increasing nuclearity. Finally, structures with low ligand ratios and metal to pnictide ratios close to 1:1 are discussed, followed by compounds that have no supporting ligands and resemble metal alloy fragments. Where appropriate, electron counting rules have been employed to explain observed structures and reactivity patterns. A particularly intense area of study has been the creation of inorganic-organometallic-organic polymers and frameworks based on discrete clusters with Ex fragments (2 ≤ x ≤ 6) where the Exfragment provides a node for structure growth in combination with transition metal coordination frameworks based on copper and silver cations and suitable organic ligands. Simple oligomers, 1-dimensional, 2-dimensional and 3-dimensional polymeric structures have all been prepared and structurally characterized. In addition to the structural data, synthetic methods are described

Spectroscopic and structural characterization of 2,4,6-tris(trifluoromethyl)phenyllithium·Et2O: a dimer stabilized by lithium fluorine contacts

1,3,5-Tris(trifluoromethyl)benzene reacts with butyl-lithium in ether/hexane to form 2,4,6-tris(trifluoromethyl)phenyl-lithium which has been characterized by low-temperature single-crystal X-ray analysis and NMR methods; the molecule exists as a dimer in which each lithium is stabilized by bonding to two carbon atoms, an oxygen of a diethyl ether molecule, and two fluorines from ortho-CF3 groups