Molybdenum disulfide has been one of the most studied hydrogen evolution catalyst materials in recent years, but its disadvantages, such as poor conductivity, hinder its further development. Here, we employ the common hydrothermal method, followed by an additional solvothermal method to construct an uncommon molybdenum disulfide with two crystal forms of 1T and 2H to improve catalytic properties. The low overpotential (180 mV) and small Tafel slope (88 mV/dec) all indicated that molybdenum disulfide had favorable catalytic performance for hydrogen evolution. Further conjunctions revealed that the improvement of performance was probably related to the structural changes brought about by the 1T phase and the resulting sulfur vacancies, which could be used as a reference for the further application of MoS2.
Keywords: electrocatalysts; hydrogen evolution reaction; molybdenum disulfide.