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Full-Text Articles in Engineering

Recent Advances In Graphene-Based Materials For Fuel Cell Applications, Hanrui Su, Yun Hang Hu Oct 2020

Recent Advances In Graphene-Based Materials For Fuel Cell Applications, Hanrui Su, Yun Hang Hu

Michigan Tech Publications

The unique chemical and physical properties of graphene and its derivatives (graphene oxide, heteroatom-doped graphene, and functionalized graphene) have stimulated tremendous efforts and made significant progress in fuel cell applications. This review focuses on the latest advances in the use of graphene-based materials in electrodes, electrolytes, and bipolar plates for fuel cells. The understanding of structure-activity relationships of metal-free heteroatom-doped graphene and graphene-supported catalysts was highlighted. The performances and advantages of graphene-based materials in membranes and bipolar plates were summarized. We also outlined the challenges and perspectives in using graphene-based materials for fuel cell applications.


Research Progress Of Metal-Nitrogen-Carbon Catalysts Toward Oxygen Reduction Reaction Inm Changchun Institute Of Applied Chemistry, Ming-Jun Xu, Jie Liu, Jun-Jie Ge, Chang-Peng Liu, Wei Xing Aug 2020

Research Progress Of Metal-Nitrogen-Carbon Catalysts Toward Oxygen Reduction Reaction Inm Changchun Institute Of Applied Chemistry, Ming-Jun Xu, Jie Liu, Jun-Jie Ge, Chang-Peng Liu, Wei Xing

Journal of Electrochemistry

The development of highly active and stable catalysts toward oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) has been facing severe challenges. In recent years, pyrolytic M-N-C catalysts and metal-organic framework derived materials made the performance of non-noble metal catalysts greatly improved, however, the molecular and atomic level understanding in the reaction active sites and the mechanism are still lacking. Here, we summarize the recent research progress made in the Changchun Institute of Applied Chemistry. We present a microporous metal-organic-framework confined strategy toward the preferable formation of ORR catalysts. Firstly, we studied the active site and proposed a new active site structure for the …


Recent Progress In Bifunctional Catalysts For Zinc-Air Batteries, Neng-Neng Xu, Jin-Li Qiao Aug 2020

Recent Progress In Bifunctional Catalysts For Zinc-Air Batteries, Neng-Neng Xu, Jin-Li Qiao

Journal of Electrochemistry

Zinc-air battery has attracted great attention from researchers due to its high energy density and power density, which is expected to be widely used in energy conversion and storage. Air electrode as the core area of oxygen catalytic reaction is the focus of the entire zinc-air battery research. Recently, many research achievements have been made in non-noble metal bifunctional catalysts/electrodes with high activity, low cost and abundant species. In this review, we mainly focus on the reaction mechanism and the recent progress in non-noble metal oxide catalyst, carbon-based catalyst, and carbon-based transition metal compound composite and self-supporting electrode. In addition, …


Fundamental Studies Of Oxygen Electrocatalysis In Alkaline Electrochemical Cells, Victoria F. Mattick Jul 2020

Fundamental Studies Of Oxygen Electrocatalysis In Alkaline Electrochemical Cells, Victoria F. Mattick

Theses and Dissertations

Until recently the world’s main source of energy has been fossil fuels, such as coal and petroleum. However, these energy sources are polluting our planet, becoming scarce and increasingly inaccessible, and are costly to extract. Therefore, much attention has been directed to harvesting clean, abundant, and renewable energy, such as solar rays and wind. However, the intermittency of solar and wind power generation requires an effective energy buffering solution (aka energy storage) to become efficient and reliable. With high efficiency and energy density, rechargeable batteries and reversible fuel cells are two of the best methods for this purpose. Unfortunately, a …


Nio@Rgo Supported Palladium And Silver Nanoparticles As Electrocatalysts For Oxygen Reduction Reaction, Shuo Yao, Tai-Zhong Huang, Rizwan Haider, Heng-Yi Fang, Jie-Mei Yu, Zhan-Kun Jiang, Dong Liang, Yue Sun, Xian-Xia Yuan Apr 2020

Nio@Rgo Supported Palladium And Silver Nanoparticles As Electrocatalysts For Oxygen Reduction Reaction, Shuo Yao, Tai-Zhong Huang, Rizwan Haider, Heng-Yi Fang, Jie-Mei Yu, Zhan-Kun Jiang, Dong Liang, Yue Sun, Xian-Xia Yuan

Journal of Electrochemistry

For pervasive applications of fuel cells, highly efficient and economical materials are required to replace Pt-based catalysts for oxygen reduction reaction (ORR). In this study, the NiO@rGO, Pd-NiO@rGO and Ag-NiO@rGO nanoparticles were synthesized, and their catalytic performances toward ORR were investigated. The results revealed that all the three materials were capable of catalyzing ORR, but both the Pd-NiO@rGO and Ag-NiO@rGO showed the better performances compared with the NiO@rGO in terms of the reaction pathway being 4-electron process, the increases of the onset potential and the intermediate yielding rate, as well as the extended stability. Moreover, the effect of Pd modification …


Challenges In The Activity And Stability Of Pt-Based Catalysts Toward Orr, Tuo Zhao, Er-Gui Luo, Xian Wang, Jun-Jie Ge, Chang-Peng Liu, Wei Xing Feb 2020

Challenges In The Activity And Stability Of Pt-Based Catalysts Toward Orr, Tuo Zhao, Er-Gui Luo, Xian Wang, Jun-Jie Ge, Chang-Peng Liu, Wei Xing

Journal of Electrochemistry

The development of highly efficient oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) catalysts is the key to the commercialization of fuel cells, where the sluggish ORR reaction rate needs to be overcome by adjusting the intermediates adsorption energies on the catalytic surfaces. To-date, platinum (Pt)-based materials are the-state-of-the-art catalysts in terms of both activity and stability in ORR, making them the preferred choice for commercial applications. However, the high cost of Pt-based catalysts limits their widespread use, leading to massive effects paid in reducing Pt loading, improving catalyst activity and stability. This article illustrates the challenges in the ORR reaction and introduces the …


Effect Of Nitrogen Content In Catalyst Precursor On Activity Of Fen/C Catalyst For Oxygen Reduction Reaction, Zhi Yang, Ya-Yun Shen, E Zhou, Cheng-Ling Wei, Hao-Li Qin, Juan Tian Feb 2020

Effect Of Nitrogen Content In Catalyst Precursor On Activity Of Fen/C Catalyst For Oxygen Reduction Reaction, Zhi Yang, Ya-Yun Shen, E Zhou, Cheng-Ling Wei, Hao-Li Qin, Juan Tian

Journal of Electrochemistry

Non-noble metal catalysts with high activity and low cost have attracted increasing interest as potential catalysts for oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) to replace Pt-based catalysts. In this paper, the effect of nitrogen content in catalyst precursor on ORR activity of FeN/C catalyst was investigated by X-ray diffraction (XRD), Brunauer-Emmet-Teller (BET) surface area and pore size distribution measurements, transmission electron microscope (TEM), thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), and rotating disk electrode (RDE) techniques. The results show that the most active catalyst was obtained by pyrolysis in argon at 1050 °C with a catalyst precursor containing 20wt% 1,10-phenanthroline, 1wt% Fe and Black Pearl 2000. …


A Porous Nano-Micro-Composite As A High-Performance Bi-Functional Air Electrode With Remarkable Stability For Rechargeable Zinc–Air Batteries, Yasir Arafat, Muhammad R. Azhar, Yijun Zhong, Xiaomin Xu, Moses O. Tadé, Zongping Shao Jan 2020

A Porous Nano-Micro-Composite As A High-Performance Bi-Functional Air Electrode With Remarkable Stability For Rechargeable Zinc–Air Batteries, Yasir Arafat, Muhammad R. Azhar, Yijun Zhong, Xiaomin Xu, Moses O. Tadé, Zongping Shao

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

The development of bi-functional electrocatalyst with high catalytic activity and stable performance for both oxygen evolution/reduction reactions (OER/ORR) in aqueous alkaline solution is key to realize practical application of zinc–air batteries (ZABs). In this study, we reported a new porous nano-micro-composite as a bi-functional electrocatalyst for ZABs, devised by the in situ growth of metal–organic framework (MOF) nanocrystals onto the micrometer-sized Ba0.5Sr0.5Co0.8Fe0.2O3 (BSCF) perovskite oxide. Upon carbonization, MOF was converted to porous nitrogen-doped carbon nanocages and ultrafine cobalt oxides and CoN4 nanoparticles dispersing inside the carbon nanocages, which further anchored on the surface of BSCF oxide. We homogeneously dispersed BSCF …