The research described in this product was performed in part in the Environmental Molecular Sciences Laboratory, a national scientific user facility sponsored by the Department of Energy's Office of Biological and Environmental Research and located at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. We have synthesized a new class of electrocatalysts for the oxygen reduction reaction, consisting of a monolayer of Pt or mixed monolayer of Pt and another late transition metal (Au, Pd, Ir, Ru, Rh, Re or Os) deposited on a Pd(1 1 1) single crystal or on carbon-supported Pd nanoparticles.
Several of these electrocatalysts exhibited very high activity, amounting to 20-fold increase in a Pt mass activity, compared with conventional all-Pt electrocatalysts. Their superior activity reflects a low OH coverage on Pt, caused by the lateral repulsion between the OH adsorbed on Pt and the OH or O adsorbed on neighboring, other than Pt, late transition metal atoms. The origin of this effect was identified through a combination of experimental and theoretical methods, employing electrochemical techniques, X-ray absorption spectroscopy, and periodic, self-consistent density functional theory calculations. This new class of electrocatalysts promises to alleviate some major problems of existing fuel cell technology by
simultaneously decreasing materials cost and enhancing performance.
Revised: April 7, 2011 |
Published: January 20, 2007
Citation
Vukmirovic M.B., J. Zhang, K. Sasaki, A.U. Nilekar, F. Uribe, M. Mavrikakis, and R.R. Adzic, et al. 2007.Platinum Monolayer Electrocatalysts for Oxygen Reduction.Electrochimica Acta 52, no. 6:2257-2263. doi:10.1016/j.electacta.2006.05.062