Oxygen vacancy regulation in multimetallic FeCoNiVMn-LDH for efficient electrocatalytic oxygen evolution reaction

Layered double hydroxide (LDH) as a promising electrocatalysts for the oxygen evolution reaction (OER) still suffers from low intrinsic activity, poor electronic conductivity, and limited exposure of reaction sites. In this study, a multimetallic FeCoNiVMn-LDH is synthesized via a sacrificial ZIF-67 template strategy. The obtained FeCoNiVMn-LDH retains the porous architecture and high specific surface area inherited from the ZIF-67 template. The incorporation of multiple metal species effectively modulates the electronic structure of the LDH, leading to optimized adsorption and desorption energy of oxygen-containing intermediates. Furthermore, the presence of high-valence V and Mn elements provides additional atomic orbitals that enhance electronic coupling among the multimetallic components. Deliberate control of Ni content promotes the formation of oxygen vacancies, which facilitates surface reconstruction during electrochemical activation and generates abundant active sites, thereby significantly improving OER performance. As a result, the optimized FeCoNiVMn-LDH exhibits a low overpotential of 239 mV at 10 mA cm −2 along with excellent durability. This study demonstrates that multimetallic regulation engineering offers a promising pathway for designing efficient OER electrocatalysts for water splitting applications. • The regulation of nickel content in FeCoNiVMn-LDH generates oxygen vacancy. • Surface reconstruction generates highly active sites to enhance catalytic activity. • The synergistic effect of multi-metals favors to form appropriate d-band center. • FeCoNiVMn-LDH exhibits excellent OER catalytic activity and good stability.