A MoS2/sulfur-doped carbon sphere nanohybrid catalyst with high-efficiency electrocatalysis for flexible counter electrodes

Molybdenum disulfide (MoS2)/sulfur-doped carbon sphere nanohybrid is facilely synthesized via sulfuring a molybdenum chloride-carbon sphere precursor on a flexible graphite paper substrate. Sulfur-doping could enhances the electrocatalytic activity for triiodide reduction. Moreover, there is the existence of atomic and electronic interactions between MoS2 and S-doped carbon spheres in the nanohybrid composite. Due to the synergistic effect, the microstructure of MoS2 is much affected, and thus exposing more plane edges and plenty of lattice defects. Besides, the conductivity of the nanohybrid is much improved with the carbon sphere additive. As a result, the dye-sensitized solar cell using the nanohybrid as counter electrode shows higher photoelectric conversion efficiency (7.72%) than those based on pure MoS2 (6.73%) and platinized F-doped tin oxide rigid glass (6.74%). (C) 2018 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.