MoS2/CNFs derived from electrospinning and heat treatment as the efficient electrocatalyst for hydrogen eovlution reaction in acidic solution

Abstract

Molybdenum disulfide (MoS2) based electrocatalysts have been proposed as substitutes for platinum group metal (PGM) based electrocatalyst to hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) in water electrolysis. Here, we studied MoS2/CNFs hybrid catalyst prepared by electrospinning method with heat treatment for polymer electrolyte membrane(PEM) water electrolysis to improve the HER activity. The physicochemical and electrochemical properties such as average diameter, crystalline properties, electrocatalitic activity for HER of synthesized MoS2/CNFs were investigated by the Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM), X-ray Diffraction (XRD), X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy (XPS), Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM), Raman Spectroscopy (Raman) and Linear Sweep Voltammetry (LSV). The as spun ATTM/PVP nanofibers were prepared by sol-gel and electrospinning method. Subsequently, the MoS2/CNFs was dereived from reduction heat treatment of ATTM at the ATTM/PVP nanofibers and carbonization heat treatment. Synthesized MoS2/ CNFs electrocatalyst had an average diameter of 179±30 nm. We confirmed that the MoS2 layers in MoS2/ CNF electrocatalyst consist of 3~4 layers from the Raman results. In addition, We confirmed that the MoS2 layers in MoS2/CNF catalyst consist of 7.47% octahedral 1T phase MoS2, 63.77% trigonal prismatic 2H phase MoS2 with 28.75% MoO3 through the XRD, Raman and XPS results. It was shown that MoS2/CNFs had the overpotential of 0.278 V at 10 mA/cm2 and tafel slope of 74.8 mV/dec in 0.5 M sulfuric acid (H2SO4) electrolyte.