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Effects Of Solvents And Electrolyte Salts On The Electrochemical Reduction Of Oxygen In Non-Aqueous Electrolytes, Yan-Yan Tian, Wei Wu, Jun Gao, Yong Yang

Journal of Electrochemistry

The electrochemical reduction processes of oxygen in different non-aqueous solvents such as acetonitrile(MeCN),propylene carbonate(PC) and their mixtures were investigated by cyclic voltammetry method.The results indicated a one electron reduction of oxygen to O2-occured in these systems as a first step reduction,no matter whether in tetrabutylammonium hexafluorophosphate(TBAPF6)/MeCN or TBAPF6/PC electrolyte.However,the CV curves in 0.1 mol·L-1 TBAPF6/MeCN showed a couple of reversible redox peaks,indicating that the reduction process of oxygen was irreversible in the 0.1 mol·L-1 TBAPF6/PC electrolyte.In the PC-based electrolyte,the reduction current peak reduced largely and the oxidation peak of O2-almost disappeared as compared to that of the former electrolytes.The possible …