This week’s digital digest features six open-access papers. Before highlighting three research papers, I would like to thank all of the reviewers for their diligent and continuing service to The Electrochemical Society, which made the following publications possible.
A strong metal support interaction (SMSI) in Pt-TiO2-x system. The aim of this research article is to test the hypothesis that the SMSI between Pt and the TiO2-x support is the origin for the hydrogen oxidation reaction (HOR) activity at unconventionally high potentials. A series of Pt/TiO2-x catalysts was examined towards the oxygen reduction reaction, hydrogen oxidation reaction, CO oxidation, and oxygen evolution reaction. The authors then provided experimental evidence to show the SMSI results in the suppression of the formation of Pt surface oxides, which is responsible for the high HOR activity at high potentials. (Contact author: Timon N. Geppert at timon.geppert@tum.de)
Quantifying proton transport in a porous catalyst layer. This research article reports a unique hydrogen pump approach to determine the proton conduction in pseudo catalyst layers as a function of relative humidity (RH) and ionomer/carbon ratio. The DC and AC methods show good agreement for Nafion 212 membrane, up to 100% RH; whereas above 100% RH in several instances DC method shows higher effective ionic conductivity. The AC method coupled with a hydrogen pump set-up is capable of determining the through-plane effective proton conductivity, which can potentially be further developed for a high throughput technique for the determination of ionomer conductivity and tortuosity within the pseudo catalyst layers. (Contact author: Iryna V. Zenyuk at iryna.zenyuk@uci.edu)
Modeling and imaging of the spatial heterogeneity in a PEMFC catalyst layer. During the past several years, FIB-SEM tomography has been extensively used to reconstruct the spatial heterogeneity in fuel cells. This research paper combines experimental tomographic data with a physics-based model. The multiscale model technique, based on the representative volume element analysis, is an extension of Mukherjee and Wang’s 2006 JES paper to elucidate the relationship between the ionomer distribution (and microstructure evolution) and the degradation resulted from corrosion in the catalyst layer. (Contact author: Partha P. Mukherjee at pmukherjee@purdue.edu)
With best regards,
Xiao-Dong Zhou
Fuel Cells, Electrolyzers, and Energy Conversion Technical Editor
Journal of The Electrochemical Society
Journal of The Electrochemical Society
Enabling High Power Density Fuel Cells by Evaporative Cooling with Advanced Porous Media
M. Cochet, A. Forner-Cuenca, V. Manzi-Orezzoli, M. Siegwart, D. Scheuble, and P. Boillat
Read now | Open access
HOR Activity of Pt-TiO2-Y at Unconventionally High Potentials Explained: The Influence of SMSI on the Electrochemical Behavior of Pt
Timon N. Geppert, Markus Bosund, Matti Putkonen, Björn M. Stühmeier, Antti T. Pasanen, Pirjo Heikkilä, Hubert A. Gasteiger, and Hany A. El-Sayed
Read now | Open access
Performances of Solid Oxide Cells with La0.97Ni0.5Co0.5O3−δ as Air-Electrodes
Qianli Ma, Sebastian Dierickx, Vaibhav Vibhu, Doris Sebold, Lambertus G. J. de Haart, André Weber, Olivier Guillon, and Norbert H. Menzler
Read now | Open access
Corrosion-Induced Microstructural Variability Affects Transport-Kinetics Interaction in PEM Fuel Cell Catalyst Layers
Navneet Goswami, Aashutosh N. Mistry, Jonathan B. Grunewald, Thomas F. Fuller, and Partha P. Mukherjee
Read now | Open access
Determining Proton Transport in Pseudo Catalyst Layers Using Hydrogen Pump DC and AC Techniques
Dinesh C. Sabarirajan, Jiangjin Liu, Yongzhen Qi, Andrea Perego, Andrew T. Haug, and Iryna V. Zenyuk
Read now | Open access
Probing the Influence of the Carbon Support on the Activity of Fe-N3/C Model Active Sites for the Oxygen Reduction Reaction
Holly M. Fruehwald, Iraklii I. Ebralidze, Peter D. Melino, Olena V. Zenkina, and E. Bradley Easton
Read now | Open access