Preparation And Electrochemical Investigation Of Pt-Based Alloy Electroactyst

The increasing use of fossil fuel and the lack of natural resources make it important to develop new energy and sustainable energy. Fuel cells are considered to be a promising energy conversion device for the future energy application. As is well known, the proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs), direct formic acid fuel cells, and direct methanol fuel cells have been regarded as the most effective fuel cells. Platinum (Pt) material is the most effective electrocatalysts for these fuel cells. However, the high cost, the low efficiency and the durability issues are the main barriers for the commercial applications of pure Pt catalyst for fuel cells. Therefore, most investigations have focused on Pt-based alloy catalysts, in order to develop more active and durable catalysts that are superior to the commercial carbon-supported platinum catalyst (Pt/C).In this work, we synthesized PtCu nanowires (NWs) with core-shell structure by using Cu nanowires as the templates in organic solvent. We examine the electrocatalytic activity and durability of PtCuNWs for oxygen reduction reaction (ORR). The ORR mass activity and specific activity of PtCu NWs are 0.216 A mgpt-1 and 0.404 mA cm’2 at 0.9 V, respectively, which are 3.1 and 3.7 times larger than that of the commercial Pt/C catalyst (0.07 A mgpt-1 and 0.110 mA cm’2, respectively). In addition, the PtCu NWs show much better durability than the commercial Pt/C catalyst after 10000-cycles stability test. Our results show that the as-synthesized PtCu NWs in organic solvent medium can improve the activity and stability of the commercial Pt/C catalyst, which could potentially be used as high performance electrocatalysts for ORR.In addition, we synthesized PtPdCu nanowires catalysts by using Cu nanowires as the templates in organic solvent. We examine the electrocatalytic activity and durability of PtPdCuNWs for oxygen reduction reaction (ORR). The ORR mass activity and specific activity of PtPdCu NWs are 0.696 A mgpt-1 and 0.1.162 mA cm-2 at 0.867 V, respectively, which are 3.8 and 4.1 times larger than that of the commercial Pt/C catalyst (0.184 A mgpt-1 and 0.287 mA cm-2, respectively). Our results show that the as-synthesized PtCu NWs in organic solvent medium can improve the activity and stability of the commercial Pt/C catalyst. Importantly, compared with PtCu NWs, the PtPdCu NWs show an improvement both in the ORR mass activity and specific activity.We report a facile synthesis of Cu/CuPt core/shell structured nanowires (NWs) with various shell thickness by tuning the adding ratio between Pt precursor and Cu template in organic solvent medium. These as-synthesized PtCu NWs exhibit a promising shell thickness-dependent electrocatalytic activity enhancement for formic acid oxidation (FAO). Among all these PtCu NWs, the Pt2Cu15 catalyst shows the highest specific activity and mass activity at 0.5 V, reaching 0.92 mA cm-2 and 0.54 A mgpt-1, respectively, which are 6.6 and 6.4 times larger than that of the commercial Pt/C catalyst. In addition, Pt2Cu15 catalyst has shown much better durability compared with the commercial Pt/C catalyst after durability test. Importantly, our results also indicate that the CO-BE can be potentially used as a useful descriptor for FAO, which is critical for the development of highly activie electrocatalysts for FAO。...