Hot Electron of Au Nanorods Activates the Electrocatalysis of Hydrogen Evolution on MoS 2 Nanosheets

Efficient water splitting through electrocatalysis holds great promise for producing hydrogen fuel in modern energy devices. Its real application however suffers from sluggish reaction kinetics due to the lack of high-performance catalysts except noble metals such as platinum. Herein, we report an active system of plasmonic-metal Au nanorods/molybdenum disulfide (MoS2) nanosheets hybrids for the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER). The plasmonic Au-MoS2 hybrids dramatically improve the HER, leading to a ∼3-fold increase of current under excitation of Au localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR). A turnover of 8.76 s(-1) at 300 mV overpotential is measured under LSPR excitation, which by far exceeds the activity…

• NN
  National Natural Science Foundation of China

  Awards: 21121091, 21327902, 21275070
• MO
  Ministry of Science and Technology of the People's Republic of China

  Award: 2012CB933800
• SF
  Science Fund for Creative Research Groups