Journal of Power Sources 141 (2005) 35–38
Short communication
Electronically conducting hybrid material as high performance
catalyst support for electrocatalytic application
B. Rajesh
a,∗
, K. Ravindranathan Thampi
a
, J.-M. Bonard
b
, H.J. Mathieu
c
,
N. Xanthopoulos
c
, B. Viswanathan
d
a
Laboratory of Photonics and Interfaces, ISIC-LPI, Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne (EPFL), Lausanne, CH-1015, Switzerland
b
Institut de Physique des Nanostructures, Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne (EPFL), Lausanne, CH-1015, Switzerland
c
Laboratoire de M´etallurgie Chimique, Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne (EPFL), Lausanne, CH-1015, Switzerland
d
Department of Chemistry, Indian Institute of Technology Madras, Chennai 600036, India
Received 7 June 2004; received in revised form 13 September 2004; accepted 27 September 2004
Available online 18 November 2004
Abstract
The electronically conducting hybrid material based on transition metal oxide and conducting polymer has been used as the catalyst support
for Pt nanoparticles. The Pt nanoparticles loaded hybrid organic (polyaniline)–inorganic (vanadium pentoxide) composite has been used
as the electrode material for methanol oxidation, a reaction of importance for the development of direct methanol fuel cells (DMFC). The
hybrid material exhibited excellent electrochemical and thermal stability in comparison to the physical mixture of conducting polymer and
transition metal oxide. The Pt nanoparticles loaded hybrid material exhibited high electrocatalytic activity and stability for methanol oxidation
in comparison to the Pt supported on the Vulcan XC 72R carbon support. The higher activity and stability is attributed to the better CO
tolerance of the composite material.
© 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Hybrid material; Catalyst support; Conducting polymers; Methanol oxidation fuel cells
1. Introduction
The attention of investigators [1–4] engaged in the devel-
opment of new functional materials for current engineering
applications has been attracted to hybrid materials based on
electrically conductive polymers and inorganic compounds.
The reason for such interest is that materials of this type fre-
quently manifest properties that cannot be achieved by the in-
dividual components; this is particularly true when one of the
component is present in the form of a nanodimensional phase
[5]. These compounds exhibit a number of useful physio-
chemical properties in addition to chemical stability, open-
ing up possibilities for their use in electrochromic devices,
∗
Corresponding author. Tel.: +41 21 693 7636; fax: +41 21 693 4111.
E-mail address: rajesh.bashyam@epfl.ch (B. Rajesh).
chemical current sources, photocatalytic and electrocatalytic
systems.
Considerable interest has been devoted in recent years to
develop suitable electrode materials for methanol oxidation
for the possible application in fuel cells. Though, research
over the past two or three decades [6–10] identified the best
catalystasPtand Pt–Rusupported oncarbon formethanol ox-
idation, there is lot of scope still available in developing alter-
nateelectrodematerials forbetter activity(withlowerPt load-
ing) and stability for methanol oxidation. Apart from Pt–Ru
catalyst, materials like Pt–WO
3
, Pt–MoO
3
and Pt–Ru–MO
x
(M = W, Mo and V) have been used as the electrode mate-
rial for methanol oxidation [11–13]. The basic reason for
choosing these transition metal oxides is that these oxides
form respective tungsten bronzes during dehydrogenation of
methanol by effectively removing the nascent hydrogen from
the Pt surface. This helps to perform the dehydrogenation
0378-7753/$ – see front matter © 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.jpowsour.2004.09.014