Confinement and phase engineering boosting 1T phase MoS2/carbon hybrid for high-performance capacitive deionization

Capacitive deionization (CDI) has attracted significant attention as a water treatment technology owing to its low cost, high efficiency, and eco-friendliness. However, the unsatisfactory desalination performance of traditional electrode materials hinders the development of CDI. Herein, 1T-MoS 2 /C hybrid microspheres are successfully fabricated through confinement and phase engineering strategies. The confinement effect of porous hollow carbon microspheres reduces the overgrowth and agglomeration of MoS 2 nanosheets, which is beneficial for exposing more active sites and enhancing stability. Meanwhile, the 1T phase MoS 2 displays high intrinsic conductivity and large interlayer spacing, which is conducive to rapid insertion/extraction of Na + . Consequently, 1T-MoS 2 /C hybrid becomes a prospect electrode material for CDI, which showcases outstanding desalination capacity (48.1 mg/g at 1.2 V), eminent desalination rate as well as exceptional stability. Moreover, the desalination mechanisms are clarified through various characterizations and density functional theory calculations. This study provides new perspectives on designing high-performance MoS 2 -based CDI electrode materials.