Alloyed Re x Mo1-x S2 Nanoflakes with Enlarged Interlayer Distances for Hydrogen Evolution

Molybdenumsulfide (MoS2) has attracted significantattention due to its great potential as a low-cost and efficient catalystfor the hydrogen evolution reaction. Developing a facile, easily upscalable,and inexpensive approach to produce catalytically active nanostructuredMoS(2) with a high yield would significantly advance itspractical application. Colloidal synthesis offers several advantagesover other preparation techniques to overcome the low reaction yieldof exfoliation and drawbacks of expensive equipment and processesused in chemical vapor deposition. In this work, we report an efficientsynthesis of alloyed Re x Mo1-x S2 nanoflakes with an enlarged interlayerdistance, among which the composition Re0.55Mo0.45S2 exhibits excellent catalytic performance with overpotentialsas low as 79 mV at 10 mA/cm(2) and a small Tafel slope of42 mV/dec. Density functional theory calculations prove that enlargingthe distance between layers in the Re x Mo1-x S2 alloy can greatlyimprove its catalytic performance due to a significantly reduced freeenergy of hydrogen adsorption. The developed approach paves the wayto design advanced transition metal dichalcogenide-based catalystsfor hydrogen evolution and to promote their large-scale practicalapplication.

Automated summary

In this study, a method for efficiently synthesizing alloyed Re x Mo1-x S2 nanoflakes with enlarged interlayer distance was reported, among which Re0.55Mo0.45S2 exhibited excellent catalytic performance. Density functional theory calculations proved that enlarging the distance between layers in the Re x Mo1-x S2 alloy can greatly improve its catalytic performance. This research paves the way for designing advanced transition metal dichalcogenide-based catalysts for hydrogen evolution and promoting their large-scale practical application.