Preparation of phthalocyanine-ligand-based MOF materials for the hydrogen evolution reaction

As a clean energy carrier, hydrogen energy demands efficient and cost-effective electrocatalysts for the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER). Although traditional noble metal catalysts exhibit high performance, their scarcity and high cost limit practical applications. This study proposes a novel strategy of constructing non-precious metal MOF materials using phthalocyanine ligands to address these challenges. The core innovation lies in designing and synthesizing a cobalt-phthalocyanine-derived MOF composite (CoPc@rGO-MOF) using a hot-solvent method. This method achieves the atomic dispersion of Co–N–C active sites within a hierarchical porous carbon matrix. The study optimizes the preparation process and investigates the structure–performance relationship for HER. The optimized CoPc@rGO-MOF demonstrated exceptional HER activity in 1 M KOH, with a low overpotential of only 98 mV at 10 mA cm -2 and a small Tafel slope of 56 mV dec -1 . Moreover, it exhibited remarkable stability, with less than 5% activity decay after 1000 cycles. Characterization revealed that the conjugated system of phthalocyanine ligands significantly enhanced charge transfer efficiency, while the hierarchical pore structure facilitated mass transport. This work provides a high-performance, non-precious metal HER catalyst and offers insights into the rational design of macrocyclic-ligand-based MOFs for energy conversion applications.