Zeolitic imidazolate framework derived Co3S4 hybridized MoS2–Ni3S2 heterointerface for electrochemical overall water splitting reactions

The production of hydrogen and oxygen from water through water electrolysis is of significant interest to generate clean energy via overall water splitting reaction. Herein, we prepare metal-organic framework based, cobalt sulfide nanoleaves followed by hydrothermal growth of hierarchical MoS2–Ni3S2 nanorods on a three-dimensional nickel foam substrate. The heterostructure of Co3S4@ MoS2–Ni3S2 catalyst electrode was served directly as an electrocatalyst for overall water splitting reactions such as oxygen evolution (OER) reactions and hydrogen evolution reactions (HER). The as-prepared Co3S4@ MoS2–Ni3S2 nanorods display outstanding electrocatalytic performance towards OER and HER with overpotential (η) of 270 mV and 136 mV at a current density of 50 mA cm−2 for OER, 10 mA cm−2 for HER in 1 M KOH solutions respectively. These results mainly originate the unique architecture of Co3S4@MoS2–Ni3S2 heterostructure, which leads to enhance electrical conductivity, exposing a number of active sites and assisting the transport of ion to the electrode and electrolyte interface. This work suggests that the rational design of hybrid architecture have possible to develop for high-performance energy conversion applications.