Mn-doped porous interconnected MoP nanosheets for enhanced hydrogen evolution

Highlights: • Mn doping strategy is proposed to enhance the HER activity of MoP for the first time. • Mn doping can optimize the electronic configuration of MoP. • Mn doped MoP is demonstrated as a highly efficient HER catalyst. • The 0.05Mn-MoP exhibits the best HER activity. Rational design of robust and highly efficient electrocatalysts for hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) is crucial for the development of energy conversion technologies. Molybdenum phosphide (MoP) has displayed excellent HER activities and triggered substantial interests as a promising water splitting electrocatalyst. In this work, a Mn doping strategy is proposed to improve the HER performances of MoP for the first time as well as the construction of novel porous interconnected structures. And the effect of doping contents and corresponding improvement mechanism are also discussed. It is found that the obtained 0.05Mn-MoP catalyst with porous interconnected nanosheets (NSs) presents the best HER properties as well as outstanding durability. The porous interconnected structures offer more exposed active sites, and the Mn doping optimizes the electronic configuration of MoP, leading to lower charge transfer resistance and higher intrinsic activity. This work provides a facile method to construct porous structures and demonstrate the effective strategy of Mn doping for the enhancement of MoP for the HER.