MoS 2  and WS 2  nanocone arrays: Impact of surface topography on the hydrogen evolution electrocatalytic activity and mass transport

Daniel Escalera-lópez; Ross Griffin; Mark Isaacs; Karen Wilson; Richard E. Palmer; Neil V. Rees

doi:10.1016/j.apmt.2018.01.006

MoS 2 and WS 2 nanocone arrays: Impact of surface topography on the hydrogen evolution electrocatalytic activity and mass transport

Daniel Escalera-lópez, Ross Griffin, Mark Isaacs, Karen Wilson, Richard E. Palmer, Neil V. Rees

College of Engineering and Physical Sciences

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

Abstract

We report the fabrication and electrochemical study of edge-abundant transition metal dichalcogenide (TMD) nanocone arrays. Time-dependent etching by sequential use of isotropic O2 and anisotropic SF6/C4F8 plasmas on nanosphere monolayer-modified TMD crystals results in very high coverage nanocone array structures with tunable aspect ratios and interspacings. Electrochemical characterization of these arrays via the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER), using a low proton concentration electrolyte (2 mM HClO4, 0.1 M NaClO4) to reveal morphology-dependent mass transport features at the proton diffusion-controlled region, show significant changes in electrocatalytic behaviour at both WS2 and MoS2: notably onset potential shifts of 100 and 200 mV, and Tafel slope decreases of 50 and 120 mV dec−1 respectively. These improvements vary according to the geometry of the arrays and the availability of catalytic edge sites, and thus the observed electrochemical behaviour can be rationalized via kinetic and mass transport effects.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	70-81
Journal	Applied Materials Today
Volume	11
Early online date	22 Feb 2018
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apmt.2018.01.006
Publication status	Published - 1 Jun 2018

Bibliographical note

© 2018 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)

Funding: EPSRC for financial support via fellowship (REP, EP/L015749/1) and the Centre for Doctoral Training in Fuel Cells and their Fuels (DE-L, NVR, EP/G037116/1).

Keywords

Transition metal dichalcogenides Hydrogen evolution Nanoelectrode array Plasma etching

Access to Document

10.1016/j.apmt.2018.01.006

MoS2 and WS2 nanocone arrays - Impact of surface topography on the hydrogen
© 2018 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)
Final published version, 3.13 MBLicence: CC BY 3.0

http://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S2352940717304808

Cite this

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title = "MoS 2 and WS 2 nanocone arrays: Impact of surface topography on the hydrogen evolution electrocatalytic activity and mass transport",

abstract = "We report the fabrication and electrochemical study of edge-abundant transition metal dichalcogenide (TMD) nanocone arrays. Time-dependent etching by sequential use of isotropic O2 and anisotropic SF6/C4F8 plasmas on nanosphere monolayer-modified TMD crystals results in very high coverage nanocone array structures with tunable aspect ratios and interspacings. Electrochemical characterization of these arrays via the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER), using a low proton concentration electrolyte (2 mM HClO4, 0.1 M NaClO4) to reveal morphology-dependent mass transport features at the proton diffusion-controlled region, show significant changes in electrocatalytic behaviour at both WS2 and MoS2: notably onset potential shifts of 100 and 200 mV, and Tafel slope decreases of 50 and 120 mV dec−1 respectively. These improvements vary according to the geometry of the arrays and the availability of catalytic edge sites, and thus the observed electrochemical behaviour can be rationalized via kinetic and mass transport effects.",

keywords = "Transition metal dichalcogenides Hydrogen evolution Nanoelectrode array Plasma etching",

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AU - Escalera-lópez, Daniel

AU - Griffin, Ross

AU - Isaacs, Mark

AU - Wilson, Karen

AU - Palmer, Richard E.

AU - Rees, Neil V.

N1 - © 2018 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) Funding: EPSRC for financial support via fellowship (REP, EP/L015749/1) and the Centre for Doctoral Training in Fuel Cells and their Fuels (DE-L, NVR, EP/G037116/1).

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N2 - We report the fabrication and electrochemical study of edge-abundant transition metal dichalcogenide (TMD) nanocone arrays. Time-dependent etching by sequential use of isotropic O2 and anisotropic SF6/C4F8 plasmas on nanosphere monolayer-modified TMD crystals results in very high coverage nanocone array structures with tunable aspect ratios and interspacings. Electrochemical characterization of these arrays via the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER), using a low proton concentration electrolyte (2 mM HClO4, 0.1 M NaClO4) to reveal morphology-dependent mass transport features at the proton diffusion-controlled region, show significant changes in electrocatalytic behaviour at both WS2 and MoS2: notably onset potential shifts of 100 and 200 mV, and Tafel slope decreases of 50 and 120 mV dec−1 respectively. These improvements vary according to the geometry of the arrays and the availability of catalytic edge sites, and thus the observed electrochemical behaviour can be rationalized via kinetic and mass transport effects.

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