Nickel telluride vertically aligned thin film by radio-frequency magnetron sputtering for hydrogen evolution reaction

The demand for renewable energy resources has led to the development of water electrolysis technology. Various transitional metal chalcogenides are investigated to adopt water electrolysis. Nickel telluride, from the family of transition metal chalcogenides, is attractive as a new cathode material for the hydrogen evolution reaction due to its metallic property. However, conventional approaches mainly focus on the solvothermal method and these have difficulty in controlling the alignment of nickel telluride. Therefore, another route to synthesize this material is necessary. In this study, for the first time, a radio-frequency (RF) magnetron sputtering method is used to synthesize a nickel telluride thin film and this method has the benefit of controlling the alignment of the nickel telluride thin film. By RF magnetron sputtering, a nickel telluride thin film is deposited on the substrate along the direction normal to the plane of the substrate, forming a columnar structure with vertical alignment. Its microstructure enables fast flow of electrons, having the advantage of hydrogen evolution reaction as a cathode material. The sample in optimized conditions shows a good performance with an overpotential of 416 mV and a Tafel slope of 63.79 mV dec−1. Therefore, the RF magnetron sputtering method can be adopted as a new approach to synthesize a vertically aligned electrocatalyst.