High Specific and Mass Activity for the Oxygen Reduction Reaction for Thin Film Catalysts of Sputtered Pt3Y
Journal article, 2017

Fuel cells have the potential to play an important role in sustainable energy systems, provided that catalysts with higher activity and stability are developed. In this work, it is found that thin alloy films of single-target cosputtered platinum-yttrium exhibit up to seven times higher specific activity (13.4 +/- 0.4 mA cm(-2)) for the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) than poly-crystalline platinum, and up to one order of magnitude higher mass activity (3.5 +/- 0.3 A mg(-1)) than platinum nanoparticles. These alloys have the highest reported ORR activity for an as-deposited material, i.e., without any additional chemical or thermal treatment. The films show an improvement in stability over the same materials in nanoparticulate form. Physical characterization shows that the thin films form a platinum overlayer supported on an underlying alloy. The high activity is likely related to compressive strain in that overlayer. As sputtering can be used to mass-produce fuel cell electrodes, the results open new possibilities for the preparation of platinum-rare earth metal alloy catalysts in commercial devices.

catalysis

platinum

alloys

fuel cells

thin films

Author

Niklas Lindahl

Chalmers, Physics, Condensed Matter Physics

E. Zamburlini

Technical University of Denmark (DTU)

Ligang Feng

Chalmers, Physics, Chemical Physics

Henrik Grönbeck

Chalmers, Physics, Chemical Physics

M. Escudero-Escribano

Technical University of Denmark (DTU)

Ifan E. L. Stephens

Technical University of Denmark (DTU)

I. Chorkendorff

Technical University of Denmark (DTU)

Christoph Langhammer

Chalmers, Physics, Chemical Physics

Björn Wickman

Chalmers, Physics, Chemical Physics

Advanced Materials Interfaces

2196-7350 (eISSN)

Vol. 4 13 1700311

Subject Categories

Inorganic Chemistry

Other Physics Topics

DOI

10.1002/admi.201700311

More information

Latest update

4/5/2022 1