Surfactant mediated electrodeposition of copper nanostructures for environmental electrochemistry: influence of morphology on electrochemical nitrate reduction reaction

The development of materials with high active surface area/surface modification is of great interest in electrochemistry due to their widespread applications. The soft template method has become one of the prominent strategies in obtaining high surface area 3-dimensional electrodes. Herein, we explore the role of various surfactants as soft templates in achieving high surface area copper nanostructures with different morphologies and their influence on catalytic activity towards nitrate reduction reaction. Using sodium dodecyl sulphate as a soft template for copper electrodeposition to prepare dendritic copper nanostructures, and 1 M KOH as electrolyte for nitrate reduction, a maximum catalytic current density of 20 mA/cm 2 with a low Tafel slope of 16±2 mV/dec was observed. This simple methodology is highly promising for the nitrate reduction reaction and alleviates the environmental contamination of nitrate to obtain high quality water for domestic usage. Graphical abstract