US Government As Represented by the Secretary of the Army

Brendan G DeLacy

Yi Rao

Shaun M Debow

Techniques for preparing an electrocatalyst include growing and immobilizing an earth-abundant metal on an MXene two-dimensional (2D) substrate using a solvothermal, hydrothermal, or electrodeposition process. The earth-abundant metal may include NiFeOOH. The earth-abundant metal may include Mn, Fe, Co, Ni, Cu, Ti, V, Cr, and a combination thereof. The earth-abundant metal may be nanoparticles. The nanoparticles may include multiple metals. The electrocatalyst may be provided for an oxygen evolution reaction. The electrocatalyst may produce a current density of 500-1000 mA/cmfor at least 20 hours without degradation thereof.

Catalysts for oxygen evolution reactions

Multilayered nanoparticles and methods of producing same are provided for controlling plasmon-exciton distance. The nanoparticles include a silver core, a polyelectrolyte spacer layer exterior to the silver core, and a J-aggregate cyanine dye outer shell. This multilayer architecture served as a framework for manipulating the dual coupling of localized surface plasmon resonance exhibited by the silver core with the molecular exciton exhibited by the J-aggregate outer shell. The polyelectrolyte spacer layer promotes the formation of an excitonic J-aggregate while serving as a means of controlling the plasmon-exciton coupling strength through changing the distance between the core and the shell. An analytical expression based on Mie Theory and the Transfer Matrix Method is provided for describing the optical response of these multilayered nanoparticles. Computational and experimental results illustrate that the absorption wavelength of the J-aggregate form of the dye is dependent on both the distance of the dye layer from the silver core and the degree of dye aggregation.

Growing community of inventors

Havre de Grace, MD, United States of America

Brendan G DeLacy