Designing Nano-catalysts for the Hydrogen Evolution Reaction

Solar energy has great potential for removing our dependence on fossil fuel. A major problem with solar energy is how to store up the energy produced during the day for later use. One method is to directly convert solar energy into storable fuel. Hydrogen production via electro- and photoelectrocatalysis is amongst the most promising pathways for this vision.

The main goal of this research was to produce and test new transition metal dichalcogenide (TMDs) nanostructures and compositions for the electrocatalytic hydrogen evolution reaction (HER). A colloidal synthesis was developed for producing pure, alloyed or doped TMDs with morphology control. Pure, doped and alloyed nanostructured materials were successfully synthesized using the developed method. Alloys of MoS₂-MoSe₂ and MoSe₂-WSe₂ nanostructures were used as model systems to study the effect of alloying on electrocatalytic HER. Electrochemistry was used in order to evaluate the effect of alloying on the intrinsic activity of the active sites. It showed that the alloys have higher performance than the pure materials, and new insights into the catalytic mechanism of these alloys towards the HER were gained.