Controlled Synthesis of Hollow Co-Mo Mixed Oxide Nanostructures and Their Electrocatalytic and Lithium Storage Properties

Hollow mixed metal oxides have received much attention owing to their great performance for wide potential applications. Here, we have successfully prepared hollow Co-Mo mixed oxide nanostructures with controlled structure and compositions, including hollow Co₃O₄/CoMoO₄ heterostructures and ball-in-ball CoMoO₄ nanospheres. Uniform CoMo-hybrid precursors are prepared through one-pot solvothermal method and then transformed into hollow structures after thermal treatment. Importantly, this strategy can be used to prepare other ternary Mo-based oxides. In view of the unique heterostructure with hollow structure, the Co₃O₄/CoMoO₄ heterostructures exhibit much better electrocatalytic activity for the oxygen evolution reaction than CoMoO₄. Moreover, the as-synthesized carbon-coated Co₃O₄/CoMoO₄ nanospheres show excellent lithium storage properties. Our result described here provides a method to fabricate other mixed metal oxides with complicated structure.