Tailoring the Sb₂Se₃/rGO Heterointerfaces for Modulation of Electrocatalytic Hydrogen Evolution Performances in Acidic Media

Global energy shift toward clean hydrogen energy entails earth-abundant noble metal-free hydrogen evolution electrocatalysts. In this work, we report a facile strategy to design Sb2Se3/rGO heterointerfaces via a solvothermal approach, which demonstrates the modulation of electrocatalytic hydrogen evolution performances, showing an electrocatalytic onset potential of −0.32 V with a lowering Tafel slope by twofold than Sb2Se3. Experimentally, it is evidenced that boosting interfacial electron transport is possible via heterointerface engineering which necessarily increases the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) performances of Sb2Se3/rGO hybrids. Density functional theory calculations were performed to understand the preferred site for H adsorption and the HER on the (001) and (230) planes. For the (001) plane, Se is the preferred HER site, whereas for the (230) surface, Se becomes the preferred site after some hydrogen coverage on the Sb sites.