The technology for the synthesis of a Pt/C catalyst for fuel cells consists in the electrochemical dispersion of two platinum electrodes of the same area under the action of an alternating pulsed current in an electrolyte (a suspension of a carbon carrier in alkali).

Synthesis options:

• Constant mixing (300 rpm);
• Cooling of the electrolyte to ~40°С;
• The average density of alternating pulsed current is 1 A/cm2, the duty cycle is 25%.

The dispersion rate of platinum is ~10 mg/cm2 h. The content of platinum in the catalyst is controlled by the duration of the synthesis. The resulting catalyst is characterized by a uniform distribution of platinum particles over the support surface.

Material properties are described in detail in publications:

• Mechanism of the platinum nanoparticles formation under conditions of nonstationary electrolysis/ Kuriganova, A.B., Lipkin, M.S., Smirnova, N.V. Mendeleev Communications, 2021, 31(2), стр. 224–226. Link
• Electrochemical dispersion technique for the preparation of Sn-doped Pt particles and their use as electrocatalysts/ Kuriganova, A.B., Leontyev, I.N., Ulyankina, A.A., Smirnova, N.V. Mendeleev Communications, 2020, 30(5), стр. 663–665. Link
• A comparison of bottom-up and top-down approaches to the synthesis of Pt/C electrocatalysts/ Kuriganova, A., Faddeev, N., Gorshenkov, M., ...Leontyev, I., Smirnova, N. Processes, 2020, 8(8), 947. Link
• PAC synthesis and comparison of catalysts for direct ethanol fuel cells/ Kuriganova, A., Chernysheva, D., Faddeev, N., ...Smirnova, N., Dobrovolskii, Y. Processes, 2020, 8(6), 712. Link
• On the Evaluation of the Average Crystalline Size and Surface Area of Platinum Catalyst Nanoparticles / Leontyev, I.N., Kuriganova, A.B., Allix, M., ...Mikheykin, A.S., Smirnova, N.V. Physica Status Solidi (B) Basic Research, 2018, 255(10), 1800240. Link
• Electrochemically synthesized Pt-based catalysts with different carbon supports for proton exchange membrane fuel cell applications/ Kuriganova, A.B., Leontyev, I.N., Maslova, O.A., Smirnova, N.V. Mendeleev Communications, 2018, 28(4), стр. 444–446. Link
• PtIr/C Catalysts Synthesized by Electrochemical Dispersion Method for Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cells/ Kuriganova, A.B., Leont’ev, I.N., Smirnova, N.V. Russian Journal of Electrochemistry, 2018, 54(6), стр. 561–565. Link