One-Step Hydrothermal Synthesis of Mo-Doped Ni3S2 Nanorods for Efficient Hydrogen Evolution Reaction

In recent years, the development of catalysts for the transition-metal sulfide hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) has received extensive attention. However, the design of low-cost transition-metal sulfide-based catalysts remains a great challenge due to slow water dissociation kinetics and poor long-term stability of the catalysts during the alkaline HER. In this paper, we report the Mo-doped Ni3S2 nanorods (Mo-Ni3S2 NRs) materials prepared by a facile one-step solvothermal method. The doping of Mo accelerates the dissociation of water, increases the electron transport capacity of Ni3S2, and improves the hydrogen adsorption capacity of Ni3S2. The introduction of NH4OH induces the growth of oriented nanorods of Ni3S2 and exposes the high-index crystallographic surface of Ni3S2. The optimized Mo-Ni3S2 NRs catalyst presents low overpotentials of 37.7 mV to reach a current density of 10 mA cm–2 in 1.0 M KOH, and outstanding durability of 24 h could be achieved for the HER.