Electrocatalytic hydrogen gas generation by cobalt molybdenum disulfide (CoMoS2) synthesized using alkyl-containing thiomolybdate precursors

Cobalt molybdenum disulfide, (CoMoS₂) catalysts are evaluated as active electrocatalysts for the production of hydrogen gas in acidic aqueous media. These highly-active hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) catalysts are obtained from pretreatment of ammonium tetrathiomolybdate (ATM) with different amines precursors, and characterized by x-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and their surface areas are determined by Brunauer–Emmett–Teller (BET) surface area analyses. Electrochemical studies indicate that these CoMoS₂ materials exhibit enhanced catalytic performance for hydrogen gas production with overpotentials ranging from 0.127 to 0.144 V, which are significant less than CoMoS₂ synthesized directly from ATM under the same synthetic techniques (0.173 V). These CoMoS₂ catalysts are also stable in the presence of strong acidic media after a considerably long period of time (10 h) for maintaining their efficiencies for hydrogen gas evolution.