Improving the oxygen evolution reaction (OER) performance or replacing OER with the value-added conversion of biomass is of great significance for the green hydrogen energy production. In this work, bimetallic species-decorated laser-induced graphene (LIG) was fabricated and demonstrated as the self-supported electrodes towards efficient OER and 5-hydroxymethylfurfural oxidation reaction (HMFOR). Three-dimensional LIG was obtained via one-step irradiation process under ambient conditions, and active metal species were then introduced through electrodeposition, with Ni-based catalyst as the primary catalytic material and Fe and Co as modified metals. Among, LIG-NiFe electrode achieved an extremely low overpotential of 241.7 mV at a current density of 20 mA/cm2 for OER and demonstrated long-term stability. This could be attributed to the promoted formation of Ni3+ active centers by Fe modified and the intrinsic porous structure of LIG providing an enhanced surface area. As for LIG-NiCo, due to the low onset potential of Co for HMF, it could achieve 99.6% HMF conversion and yielded value-added 2, 5-furandicarboxylic acid (FDCA) with a selectivity of 87.1%. Coupled with the merit of facile fabrication of LIG framework, this study demonstrates that LIG-based electrodes assume great practical application value in electrocatalytic reactions.

Self-supporting laser-induced graphene-based electrodes for efficient OER and 5-hydroxymethylfurfural oxidation
    Abstract
        Graphical abstract
    1 Introduction
    2 Experimental section
        2.1 Materials
        2.2 Preparation of metal decorated laser-induced graphene (LIG-M) electrodes
        2.3 Characterization
        2.4 Electrochemical test and product analysis
    3 Results and discussion
        3.1 Preparation and characterization of LIG-M
        3.2 LIG-NiFe electrode for OER
        3.3 LIG-NiCo electrode for HMFOR
    4 Conclusions
    Acknowledgements 
    References

• Weihua Zhou(School of Physics and Materials Science, Nanchang University, Nanchang 330031, Jiangxi, China)
• Xinyu Xiao(School of Physics and Materials Science, Nanchang University, Nanchang 330031, Jiangxi, China, Key Laboratory of Marine Materials and Related Technologies, Ningbo Institute of Materials Technology and Engineering, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Ningbo 315201, China)
• Mingyue Li(Key Laboratory of Marine Materials and Related Technologies, Ningbo Institute of Materials Technology and Engineering, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Ningbo 315201, China)
• Guangmeng Chen(Key Laboratory of Marine Materials and Related Technologies, Ningbo Institute of Materials Technology and Engineering, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Ningbo 315201, China)
• Weiwei Zhao(Key Laboratory of Marine Materials and Related Technologies, Ningbo Institute of Materials Technology and Engineering, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Ningbo 315201, China) Corresponding author
• Xiaoqing Liu(Key Laboratory of Marine Materials and Related Technologies, Ningbo Institute of Materials Technology and Engineering, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Ningbo 315201, China)