• DOI:10.1021/nl400258t
• Corpus ID: 207624259

Synthesis of MoS2 and MoSe2 films with vertically aligned layers.

@article{Kong2013SynthesisOM,
  title={Synthesis of MoS2 and MoSe2 films with vertically aligned layers.},
  author={Desheng Kong and Haotian Wang and Judy J. Cha and Mauro Pasta and Kristie J. Koski and Jie Yao and Yi Cui},
  journal={Nano letters},
  year={2013},
  volume={13 3},
  pages={
          1341-7
        }
}

• Desheng Kong, Haotian Wang, +4 authors Yi Cui
• Published 12 February 2013
• Materials Science
• Nano letters

Layered materials consist of molecular layers stacked together by weak interlayer interactions. They often crystallize to form atomically smooth thin films, nanotubes, and platelet or fullerene-like nanoparticles due to the anisotropic bonding. Structures that predominately expose edges of the layers exhibit high surface energy and are often considered unstable. In this communication, we present a synthesis process to grow MoS2 and MoSe2 thin films with vertically aligned layers, thereby maximally exposing the edges on the film surface. Such edge-terminated films are metastable structures of MoS2 and MoSe2, which may find applications in diverse catalytic reactions. We have confirmed their catalytic activity in a hydrogen evolution reaction (HER), in which the exchange current density correlates directly with the density of the exposed edge sites.