Piezotronic-enhanced oxygen evolution reaction enabled by a Au/MoS2 nanosheet catalyst

Abstract

Piezoelectric effect has been widely used in the photocatalytic and photoelectrochemical fields due to its unique property of modulating the energy bands of piezoelectric materials. In this work, we demonstrated that the piezoelectric effect can also be employed in the oxygen evolution reaction (OER) using non-centrosymmetric structured MoS₂ nanosheets loaded with Au nanoparticles. Piezoelectric force microscopy (PFM) measurement reveals a piezoelectric response of the Au–MoS₂ nanosheets. The prepared Au nanoparticle-loaded MoS₂ nanosheet catalyst shows an enhanced OER performance under ultrasonic vibration, which is ascribed to the piezo-enhanced electrocatalytic effect. In addition, the proposed catalyst exhibits a piezo-catalytic effect in dye decomposition reactions. This study paves a way to design highly active catalysts for energy and environmental applications.