Graphite Carbon-Supported Mo2C Nanocomposites by a Single-Step Solid State Reaction for Electrochemical Oxygen Reduction.

K Huang,M Lei,S Lin,W J Wang,J Liu,Y G Wang,C Liang,R Zhang,T Z Yang,D Y Fan,K Bi,Jason B Love

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0138330

Abstract

Novel graphite-molybdenum carbide nanocomposites (G-Mo2C) are synthesized by a typical solid state reaction with melamine and MoO3 as precursors under inert atmosphere. The characterization results indicate that G-Mo2C composites are composed of high crystallization and purity of Mo2C and few layers of graphite carbon. Mo2C nanoparticles with sizes ranging from 5 to 50 nm are uniformly supported by surrounding graphite layers. It is believed that Mo atom resulting from the reduction of MoO3 is beneficial to the immobilization of graphite carbon. Moreover, the electrocatalytic performances of G-Mo2C for ORR in alkaline medium are investigated by cyclic voltammetry (CV), rotating disk electrode (RDE) and chronoamperometry test with 3M methanol. The results show that G-Mo2C has a considerable catalytic activity and superior methanol tolerance performance for the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) benefiting from the chemical interaction between the carbide nanoparticles and graphite carbon.

Highlights

As is well known to all, oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) is the main performance-limiting factor due to its sluggish kinetics in the high-efficiency energy conversion devices such as fuel cells and metal-air batteries [1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15]
The sharp and strong peaks and highly exposed (101) plane indicate the good crystallization of the Mo2C nanoparticles while the unobvious diffraction peaks of graphite carbon in the pattern can be attribute to the limited content
It can be observed that Mo2C nanoparticles with sizes ranging from ca. 5 nm to 50 nm anchored on the layers of graphite carbon uniformly corresponding to the results of XRD analysis

Summary

Introduction

As is well known to all, ORR is the main performance-limiting factor due to its sluggish kinetics in the high-efficiency energy conversion devices such as fuel cells and metal-air batteries [1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15]. Jager et al synthesized micro/ mesoporous carbide derived carbon powder from Mo2C using high-temperature chlorination method as a very active catalyst for ORR [32].

Results

Conclusion