Hydrothermal controlled growth of MoTe2/MoO3-x materials: Synthesis mechanism, light-matter interaction and its photoelectrochemical activity

1 T ' phase molybdenum ditelluride (1 T '-MoTe2) is predicted to be a novel two-dimensional topological insulator that will play a crucial role in future applications ranging from spintronics to quantum electronic devices. Adjusting the introduction to O in MoTe2 is used to tune the charge separation efficiency, which charge to transfer regulation is a challenge. Here, we report the controllable growth of MoTe2/MoO3-x based on the regulation of experimental parameters, and it is necessary to reveal its structure-activity relation-ship. The characterization result indicated that due to the existence of unsaturated bonds between atoms due to the increase in temperature, the growth direction of nanosheets changes from lateral to agglom-eration and stacks into different external morphologies. In addition, the electronic and bonding properties of the MoTe2 surface layer before and after the introduction to O was investigated by photoluminescence spectroscopy and density functional theory calculations. The results suggest that O is absorbed at defect sites and disrupts the Mo-Te covalent bond, resulting in a shift in the characteristic energy level within the optical bandgap. It is demonstrated that the surface of MoTe2 exhibits a higher level of metallic conductivity after O intercalation into tellurium vacancies. The photoelectrochemical experiment results show that MoTe2 after introduction to MoO3-x has optoelectronic properties and are attractive photoelectrochemical materials. Therefore, this work has made significant progress of the study of low-temperature preparation of 1 T '-MoTe2 and the introduction to MoO3-x on its optical properties and electrochemical properties. (c) 2023 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.