Self-Supported Dendritic Pd Nanostructures: Surfactant-Free Synthesis and Their Superior Activity for Methanol Electro-Oxidation

Abstract

This paper reports a surfactant-free synthesis of clean-surface dendritic Pd nanostructures. The key of this synthetic strategy was using ethanol as a reductant to directly reduce Pd(OH)2. In terms of electrocatalytic methanol oxidation in alkaline media, the clean-surface and self-supported Pd nanostructures are beneficial to a high catalytic performance, including superior electrocatalytic activity and stability. The as-prepared dendritic Pd shows 2.57 and 4.39 times higher specific activity than palladium nanoparticles and a commercial Pd/C catalyst, respectively. Furthermore, we demonstrated that the clean-surface nanoparticles exhibit higher performance than that of the surfactant-capped Pd nanostructures for methanol electro-oxidation. Therefore, the dendritic Pd nanostructures are potential candidates as the efficient electrode material in fuel cells.