Achievement

The PI (Prof Chhowalla) has recently developed a new class of catalysts based on monolayers of exfoliated transition metal dichalcogenide nanosheets. These catalysts are single layered sheets of MoS2 and WS2 that are capable of electroatalytically evolving hydrogen at overpotentials close to the those of Pt. Since these materials are inexpensive and earth abundant, they have tremendous potential for integration into fuel cells and other clean energy technologies. The work shows that the synthesis of new phase metallic phase of MoS2 or WS2 leads to substantial enhancement in catalytic activity. DFT calculations have been performed to correlate the performance with the metallic phase. High resolution transmission microscopy shows that the material is also strained which also improves the catalytic performance, according to the calculations. A provisional patent has been filed on this discovery.