Novel porous molybdenum tungsten phosphide hybrid nanosheets on carbon cloth for efficient hydrogen evolution

Abstract

Nanostructural modification and chemical composition tuning are paramount to developing effective non-noble hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) catalysts for water splitting. Herein, we report a novel excellent porous molybdenum tungsten phosphide (Mo–W–P) hybrid nanosheet catalyst for hydrogen evolution, which is synthesized via in situ phosphidation of molybdenum tungsten oxide (Mo–W–O) hybrid nanowires grown on carbon cloth. The three-dimensional (3D) hierarchical hybrid electrocatalyst exhibits impressively high electrocatalytic activity with a low overpotential of 138 mV required to achieve a high current density of 100 mA cm⁻² and a small Tafel slope of 52 mV dec⁻¹ in 0.5 M H₂SO₄, which are significantly higher than those of single MoP nanosheets and WP₂ nanorods. Such an outstanding performance of the Mo–W–P hybrid electrocatalyst is attributed to the 3D conductive scaffolds, porous nanosheet structure, and strong synergistic effect of W and Mo atoms in Mo–W–P, making it a very promising catalyst for hydrogen production. Our findings demonstrate that careful control over the morphology and composition of the electrocatalyst can achieve highly efficient hybrid electrocatalysts.