Abstract
In electrochemical energy conversion and storage, existing catalysts often contain a high percentage of noble metals such as Pt and Pd. In order to develop low-cost electrocatalysts, one of the effective strategies involves alloying noble metals with other transition metals. This strategy promises not only significant reduction of noble metals but also the tunability for enhanced catalytic activity and stability in comparison with conventional catalysts. In this report, some of the recent approaches to developing alloy catalysts for electrocatalytic oxygen reduction reaction in fuel cells will be highlighted. Selected examples will be also discussed to highlight insights into the structural and electrocatalytic properties of nanoalloy catalysts, which have implications for the design of low-cost, active, and durable catalysts for electrochemical energy production and conversion reactions.
Highlights
The design of active, stable and low-cost catalysts is essential for many reactions in electrochemical energy production, conversion and storage
As shown for a series of binary and ternary alloy nanoparticle systems in Table 1 [12,13,14,15,16,17,23,24,25,26,27,28,29,30,31,32,33,34,35], the catalysts prepared by the molecularly-mediated synthesis and thermochemical processing methods have demonstrated enhanced catalytic and electrocatalytic properties for oxygen reduction reaction (ORR), methanol oxidation reaction (MOR), and ethanol oxidation reaction (EOR), etc
The ability to control the nanoscale alloying structures is essential for understanding the enhanced electrocatalytic activities of Pt or Pd based nanoalloys
Summary
The design of active, stable and low-cost catalysts is essential for many reactions in electrochemical energy production, conversion and storage. Especially alloy nanoparticles, have attracted a great deal of interest in both experimental and theoretical studies [1,2,3] It is the nanoscale size range over which metal nanoparticles undergo a transition from metallic to atomic properties which leads to unique electronic and catalytic properties different from their bulk counterparts. The degree of segregation, mixing and atomic ordering depends on a number of factors, including relative strengths of differences in atomic sizes, surface energies of the component element, homoatomic vs heteroatomic bonds, charge transfer between the different atomic species, and strength of binding to surface ligands or support materials. One important focus is the understanding of the structural correlation of nanoscale alloying properties with the electrocatalytic properties
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