Fabrication of Ordered Mesoporous Silica-Carbon Nanotubes Composites as Catalyst Supports for Loading with Pt Nanoparticles and Their Electrocatalytic Performance

Abstract

Ordered mesoporous silica-carbon nanotubes composites have been obtained using tetraethyl- orthosilicate as silicon source and cetyltrimethylammonium bromide as templating agent and subsequentlyl were used as supports for loading with platinum nanoparticles by a microwave-irradiated polyol process. X-ray diffraction (XRD) and transmission electron microscope (TEM) show that carbon nanotubes is highly dispersed into silicon oxidation substrate. Electrocatalysis tests reveal that Pt-C/Si catalysts show excellent catalytic performance, which could be due to the doped of the high electrical conductivity carbon nanotubes (CNTs) and the ordered mesoporous structure that is beneficial to electron transfers. When 40 milligram of carbon nanotubes was added to the composites, the electrochemical active surface area (EASA) of this elec- trocatalyst is 120.9 m 2 •g -1