Defective engineering of heterostructured N-Mo2C@MoO3-x electrode materials for the dual function of electrochemical sensing and supercapacitor applications

Abstract

In this study, the novel nanostructure of N-Mo2C@MoO3-x hybrid electrode materials was successfully designed by the carbothermic process. N-Mo2C@MoO3-x hybrids were used for dual applications, such as non-enzymatic electrochemical detection of hydroquinone (HQ) and resorcinol (RS), and energy storage supercapacitor. In particular, the N-Mo2C@MoO3-x demonstrated a simultaneous detection of linear response to (HQ) and resorcinol (RS) in the concentration ranging from 0.04 to 400 μM and 0.1 to 350 μM. HQ and RS have detection limits of 0.005 and 0.01 μM (S/N = 3), respectively. In addition, the asymmetric supercapacitors (ASC) have been fabricated via a positive electrode of N-Mo2C@MoO3-x hybrids and a negative electrode of (RGO) nanosheets using a 1 M Na2SO4 electrolyte solution. The ASC has shown excellent electrochemical properties, such as high areal capacitance (0.8 F/cm2 at 0.1 A/g), cyclic stability (89.5% after 5000 cycles), energy density (224 and 140.8 Wh/kg) at a power density (20,160 and 33,600 W/kg), and excellent rate capability.