posted 28 Jul 2015, 05:06 by info admin
Ling Zhang, Jens Ulstrup, Jingdong Zhang*
Department of Chemistry, NanoChemistry group, Technical University of Denmark (DTU), Denmark,
Noble
metal nanoparticles (NPs), such as platinum (Pt) and palladium (Pd) NPs are
promising catalysts for dioxygen reduction and oxidation of molecules such as
formic acid and ethanol in fuel cells. Carbon nanomaterials are ideal
supporting materials for electrochemical catalysts due to their good
conductivity, chemical inertness and low cost [1]. Improvement of catalytic
efficiency and stability of the NPs is, however, essential for their wider
applications in electrochemical energy conversion/storage. The activities of
noble metal catalysts depend not only on their size, composition, and shapes
[2] but also on their interfacial interaction with the supporting electrodes.
In this work we aim at chemical production of size and shape controlled,
specifically 22 nm cubic Pd NPs, and further understanding of the Pd NPs as
electrocatalysts at the nanometer scale using both scanning tunneling
microscopy (STM) and atomic force microscopy (AFM) which have proved to be
highly efficient techniques to map the in
situ structures of self-assembled molecular monolayers at molecular or
sub-molecular resolution [3]. Electrocatalysis of the Pd NPs immobilized on
atomically flat, highly oriented pyrolytic graphite (HOPG) will be investigated
by electrochemical SPM. This study offers promise for development of new
high-efficiency catalyst types with low-cost for fuel cell technology.
- Y. S. Jeong, J.-B. Park, H.-G. Jung, J. Kim, X.
Luo, J. Lu, L. Curtiss, K. Amine, Y.-K. Sun, B. Scrosati and Y. J. Lee, Nano Lett., 2015, 15, 4261-4268.
- L. Zhang, W. Niu and G. Xu, Nano Today, 2012, 7, 586-605.
- J. Zhang, A. C.
Welinder, Q. Chi and J. Ulstrup, Phys.
Chem. Chem. Phys., 2011, 13,
5526-5545.
Ling
Zhang is a postdoc in the NanoChemistry group, Department of Chemistry,
Technical University of Denmark (DTU). The current project is supported by The
H.C. Ørsted COFUND Program. Her research interests focus on shape controlled
synthesis of colloidal noble metal nanocrystals and their electrochemical
catalytic properties, electron transfer of molecules and biomolecules, and
electrochemical catalysis of 2D materials. She has a strong expertise in
scanning probe microscopy, electrochemical catalysis, synthesis of shape
controlled colloidal noble metal nanocrystals, and structural analysis of
nanoparticles. She obtained her Ph. D. degree at Changchun Institute of Applied
Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) in 2014 and a bachelor degree at
Department of Chemistry of Jilin University in 2008. She worked at Department
of Physics, Hong Kong Polytechnic University as a Research Associate in the
electrocatalysis of 2D materials in 2014. She won the scholarship of the joint
CAS-CNRS doctoral promotion program and worked on enzyme projects at Université
Paris Diderot in 2012. She has published
more than 20 papers, including papers in ACS
Nano, Nano Today, and Analytical Chemistry, and has attended
five international conferences in nanomaterials and electrochemistry. |
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