Study of Hydrogen Evolution Reaction by Molybdenum Oxide Doped TiO2Nanotubes

In this study, titanium nanotubes, prepared by anodization method, showing high surface and strong chemical stability in acidic and basic media, have been employed for the application to the electrodes for water splitting in KOH solution. Due to its high polarization resistance of TiO₂ itself, proper catalysts are essentially required to reduce overpotentials for water oxidation and reduction. Most of academic literature showed noble metal catalysts for foreign dopants in TiO₂ electrodes. From commercialization point of view, screening of low-cost catalyst is important. Herein, we propose molybdenum oxide as low-cost catalysts among various catalysts tested in the experiments, which exhibits the highest performance for hydrogen evolution reaction in highly alkaline solution. We showed that molybdenum oxide doped electrode can be operated in extreme acidic and basic conditions as well.