Abstract
Platinum (Pt)-based nanoparticle metals have received a substantial amount of attention and are the most popular catalysts for direct methanol fuel cell (DMFC). However, the high cost of Pt catalysts, slow kinetic oxidation, and the formation of CO intermediate molecules during the methanol oxidation reaction (MOR) are major challenges associate with single-metal Pt catalysts. Recent studies are focusing on using either Pt alloys, such as Fe, Ni, Co, Rh, Ru, Co, and Sn metals, or carbon support materials to enhance the catalytic performance of Pt. In recent years, Pt and Pt alloy catalysts supported on great potential of carbon materials such as MWCNT, CNF, CNT, CNC, CMS, CNT, CB, and graphene have received remarkable interests due to their significant properties that can contribute to the excellent MOR and DMFC performance. This review paper summaries the development of the above alloys and support materials related to reduce the usage of Pt, improve stability, and better electrocatalytic performance of Pt in DMFC. Finally, discussion of each catalyst and support in terms of morphology, electrocatalytic activity, structural characteristics, and its fuel cell performance are presented.
Introduction
Fuel cell technology has gained widespread attention around the world. Fuel cells (FCs) are a promising alternative power generation technology that converts chemical energy to electrical energy through an electrochemical reaction [1, 2]. Moreover, for fuel cell technology, the main focus in fuel cell technology is to generate low-cost production, thus achieving powerful performance of the fuel cell system and discovering durable materials. Nevertheless, the common issues that arise in current fuel cell technology are that the systems involve high intrinsic costs and poor durability [1]. Despite its promise as a fuel cell, direct methanol fuel cells (DMFCs) have challenges and limitations, leading researchers to study methods to improve the DMFC efficiency and performance. Many problems with DMFCs have been identified and remain unsolved, including crossover of methanol fuel from the anode electrode to the cathode electrode [3,4,5] poor performance caused by the slow kinetics rate, instability of the catalyst, and thermal and water management [6,7,8].
Recently, there have been numerous investigations on fuel cells, including DMFC, proton exchange membrane fuel cell (PEMFC), solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC), and so on, which are popular fuel cell technologies. As a novel energy source, DMFCs can be used for mobile and stationary applications [9, 10]. Many research advances have been achieved in the fuel cell field. Among the fuel cells, DMFCs have been extensively studied in recent years [11,12,13,14,15,16] because of their many advantages, such as high power density, ease of fuel handling, ease of charging, and low environmental impact [17, 18]. However, several technical challenges for the commercialization of DMFCs remain unresolved, including methanol crossover, low chemical reaction rates, and catalyst poisoning. However, DMFCs still have received attention from many researchers and have become the most popular fuel cells because of their low-temperature operation (DMFC systems operate at 373 K). Due to DMFC’s advantages of high energy efficiency and rapid start-up system, DMFC technology is very suitable to be applied as residential power sources, batteries in mobile devices, and as vehicle fuel [19,20,21,22]. In addition, the concept of DMFCs could be further studied to find alternative fuel sources such as from natural gas and biomass, as well as the fermentation of agricultural products to produce ethanol, in order to minimize the dependency on insecure energy sources [14].
In DMFC, anode side is supplied with methanol solution that will undergo electrooxidation to carbon dioxide (CO2) through the reaction below:
While at the cathode side the proton, the oxygen (from air) is reduced to water:
The net equation DMFC reaction can be summarized as follows:
In DMFC systems, there are two types of DMFC modes: active and passive modes [23,24,25]. In an active DMFC system, the outlet stream of the DMFC stack is recirculated through the closed-loop control of the liquid methanol feed. Meanwhile, the liquid methanol at the anode stream is controlled by a methanol concentration sensor that plays an important role in providing sufficient injection of additional methanol and water to restore this fuel based on target concentration. There are several types of methanol concentration sensors that are used in the DMFC system to control and maintain the methanol feed concentration [17]. Usually, the liquid methanol is delivered to the anode side by a peristaltic pump while the surrounding air containing oxygen is supplied to the cathode side by a blower or fan [16]. In a passive mode of DMFC system, the liquid methanol is fed continuously to the system. This passive concept is very attractive for DMFCs system [26,27,28]. The concept of passive means the system operates totally autonomously without any support devices. The concept of passive DMFC means the system operates totally autonomously without any assistance of external device for pumping methanol and blowing air into the stack. In the passive mode of DMFC system, the catalyst layer will be supplied by methanol and oxygen as it reactants. During methanol oxidation reaction (MOR), CO2 and water will be removed out from the cell by passive means, i.e., diffusion, natural convection, capillary action, etc. [20]. Passive mode DMFC seems more advantageous compared to the active mode DMFC in terms of simpler, more compact design, and low cost. The complex system design and controls can be a disadvantage of active mode DMFC [21]. From the practical uses aspect, active mode DMFC appears to be more appropriate in high-power system, whereas the passive mode DMFC is more suitable to be used in low-power requirements [22].
Figure 1 shows the set-up and design for a single-cell DMFC. A single-cell DMFC stack consists of a five-layer membrane electrode assembly (MEA) sandwiched by two plates which are anode and cathode. At the anode side, liquid methanol (contain methanol and deionized water) and absolute methanol is flowed into the channel by a peristaltic pump. At the cathode side, air is pumped into fuel cell by a rotameter. The temperature controller in DMFC stack is used to maintain the working temperature in the cell by a supplementary heating device. The electronic load device is used to change the current density to different levels and measure the corresponding values of the voltage. The cell performance is monitored by an electrochemical workstation, while the production of CO2 as final product of the overall reaction is measured by a CO2 concentration detector [23]. In direct methanol fuel cell, there are several importance operating parameters that must be considered during experimental study, which are (i) working temperature, (ii) methanol concentration, and (iii) input flow rates of feed methanol solution and air [23]. Figure 2a, b shows the DMFC’s active and passive mode, respectively.
A general experimental set-up for single cell DMFC [23]
This review will focus on the recent progress in the researches and developments of catalyst support based on Pt catalyst as the noble catalyst in DMFC. We include the activity of Pt-based catalysts combined with alloys, metals, transition metals, metal carbides, metal nitrides, and various carbonaceous species, such as graphene/graphene oxide (G/GO), carbon nanotube (CNT), carbon nanofiber (CNF), carbon nanocoil (CNC), carbon black (CB), multiwall carbon nanotube (MWCNT), and carbon mesoporous (CMS) supports, as well as conductive polymers, such as polyaniline (PANi) and polypyrrole (Ppy) as the support material. Many synthesis methods can be applied to prepare Pt-based catalysts. The most common methods applied to obtain nanoscale Pt particles are impregnation [29,30,31,32,33,34], hydrothermal techniques [35,36,37,38,39,40,41], microemulsion [42,43,44,45], and reduction [46, 47]. Generally, the preparation method could affect the morphology and size of the catalyst particles; thus, the selection of the method for catalyst synthesis is very important.
Performance of Various Types of Pt-Based Catalysts
Over the past decade, many researchers have focused their research on the development of electrocatalyst in order to enhance its electrocatalytic activity in methanol MOR for DMFC system [37, 38]. Platinum (Pt) is a single-metal catalyst that shows significantly high catalytic activity for the MOR. However, pure Pt alone in a DMFC system may be easily poisoned by the intermediate species, i.e., carbon monoxide (CO), and the high cost of the Pt catalyst limits its commercial application as an electrocatalyst, thereby lowering the kinetic rate of methanol oxidation in DMFC system [48,49,50]. These three points are the main obstacles and limitations of using Pt alone as an electrocatalyst for DMFC. However, to overcome these hindrances, several studies have been conducted to synthesize Pt-based alloy electrocatalysts to achieve better electrocatalytic performance with less Pt usage [11, 47, 51, 52]. Normally, the average size of Pt particles and its morphology can be determined through scanning emission micrograph (SEM) or transmission electron micrograph (TEM) analysis, which are most common methods in catalysis field that can be used to characterize the physical properties of electrocatalysts. Table 1 shows the average particle sizes of the Pt particles with different of synthesis methods, properties, and their performances.
Bimetallic PtRu is considered as the most active catalyst due to its bifunctional mechanism and the ligand effects [48, 53]. PtRu becomes an interesting catalyst alloy, and has been used until nowadays with many carbon supports. However, the toxicological effect of the addition of ruthenium (Ru) metal remains uncertain [49]. Therefore, research on less expensive alloys that mix Pt with other nonprecious metals has been performed [49,50,51,52, 54,55,56,57], as discussed in “Performance of Pt-based alloys” section.
Performance of Pt-Based Alloys
Arico et al. [35] found that numerous studies have been conducted to increase the catalytic activity of Pt catalysts in the MOR. In many studies, the optimal Pt-Ru ratio has been identified as 1:1, and particle sizes on the nanosized scale are the ideal size to improve catalyst utilization. However, Shi et al. [38] identified that 3:2 was the optimal ratio for Pt-Ru in their experiments to enhance MOR catalytic activity. Other than that, the electrocatalytic activity for methanol electrooxidation activity can also be increased if the PtRu electrocatalyst particles are nanosized particles in the range of 2–4 nm. Paulas et al. [39] agreed with this statement. As we know, Pt shows high reactivity toward methanol fuel, rendering Pt metal as an ideal electrocatalyst for the anode electrode in DMFC system. Nevertheless, during MOR of Pt catalyst, carbon monoxide (CO), i.e., the intermediate species, will form on the surface of Pt particles, which thus poisons the catalyst surface [58,59,60,61]. Thus, some efforts are needed to overcome the problem related to the formation of poisonous species on the Pt particles surface, so that they do not cover up the active site areas of Pt. Generally, binary alloys, such as PtRu [62,63,64,65,66], PtRh [67,68,69,70,71], PtAu [72,73,74], PtSn [62, 63, 75,76,77], PtNi [64,65,66,67,78,69], PtCo [70, 71, 78,79,80], and PtFe [81,82,83,84,85], are frequently employed as electrocatalyst combinations for the anode electrode in DMFC system. The additions of these metals, such as ruthenium (Ru), tin (Sn), and rhodium (Rh), are believed to produce higher catalytic activity.
Incorporation of Nickel (Ni) into platinum-based catalyst gives superior performance for MOR and DMFC. In latest research, Guerrero-Ortega and co-workers explain the addition of Ni in the Pt-Vulcan support promotes an important increment in the faradic current during MOR of one order of magnitude, even though the use Pt is lower in the bimetallic catalyst [55] . Their experimental results also suggested that the addition of Ni promotes some structural and electronic modifications that enhance a better reaction performance at the electrode interface. In another work, incorporation of Au into Pt alloy enhanced the electrocatalytic activities because of the changing electronic structure and the improvement of the electrochemically active area (ECSA) [47]. While, the addition of Tin (Sn) to Pt-based alloy showed an increment in electrocatalytic activity, which is strongly influenced by the incorporation of Sn in its alloy system and oxidized forms, boosting the reaction more readily because of the lower oxidation potential [56]. Also, the addition of Cobalt (Co) to Pt-based alloy improved the catalytic properties greatly by PtCo (1:9)/rGO catalyst that found to be ten times higher than Pt/rGO [51]. The increase in current density is attributed to higher dispersion of PtCo nanoparticles on hydrophilic nature of rGO support that promotes water activation and leads to oxidize the COads on Pt sites. Furthermore, according to the bifunctional mechanism of Co, it promotes the H2O activation creating more -OH ions and other O2-containing species to oxidize CO- intermediates species on Pt site [57]. This bifunctional mechanism of Co could also be used for other catalytic transition metals toward MOR. The catalytic oxidation mechanism for CO species to CO2 in the presence of PtCo catalysts can be summarized as follows:
Furthermore, Löffler et al. [86] successfully synthesized PtRu as the anode catalyst for DMFCs by which produced the most active electrocatalyst for methanol electrooxidation at approximately 50 at.% Ru. Meanwhile, Dinh et al. reported [87] that PtRu with ratio of PtRu 1:1 have a stronger metallic behavior and higher electrocatalytic activity for methanol oxidation (MOR). The performance are related to these two major factors: (i) maximized catalyst surface area and (ii) catalyst surface with maximum number of metal alloy sites of atomic ratio close to 1:1. Both of these group also showed highly. Based on the bifunctional mechanism, Aricò et al. [58] and Goodenough et al. [62] suggested that the CO intermediate species that formed on the Pt surface-active sites can be oxidized to carbon dioxide (CO2) by active oxygen atoms formed on the secondary elements, for example Ru, Sn, and Mo, in the lower potential region. Table 1 summarized the performance of various type of Pt alloy catalyst carried out by researchers for MOR. According to bifunctional mechanism [88,89,90], the MOR on supported PtRu alloy catalysts can be summarized as the following equation. Pt is a more active catalyst for the methanol adsorption than Ru. Hence, the overall reaction on PtRu electrocatalysts for methanol oxidation reaction obeys the bifunctional mechanism.
Referring to this bifunctional mechanism, methanol is initially dissociated and adsorbed on Pt, subsequently decomposed to COads and/or formyl-like species -CHOads by dehydrogenation reaction (7). At the same time, water dissociates to OHads and adsorbed on Ru sites (8). Then the species adsorbed on Pt and Ru sites and combine together to form CO2 molecule (9) and (10). The reaction between Pt–COads and Ru–OHads leads to CO2 evolution, generating refreshed Pt and Ru sites (reaction 10). Whereas, another work done by Ewelina Urbanczyk et al. [48] carried out the methanol oxidation reaction for PtNi catalyst in alkaline medium (1.0 M KOH). Theoretically, the methanol oxidation reaction in alkaline medium is:
The reaction initiates at Pt electrode of the DMFC to carbon dioxide. During this process, intermediate molecules (CO), may form that can cause poison and deactivation of the Pt active side. This CO molecule is a product of incomplete oxidation of methanol. The incomplete methanol oxidation forms the CO as the intermediate product (Eq. 11). The electrocatalyst surface can also adsorb hydroxyl groups (Eq. 6). Finally, due to the desorption of the main product, carbon dioxide is formed (13). The second poison which may be produced during the methanol oxidation is methane. In this case, the following reaction can occur (8). The total oxidation of the intermediate form of carbon to carbon dioxide in the electrochemical reaction is as follows:
Currently, researchers are still studying alloying techniques to improve the catalytic activity of Pt-based electrocatalysts by fabricating ternary and quaternary alloys of Pt, such as PtRuSn [91, 92], PtRuNi [93,94,95], PtRuMo [70, 96, 97], quaternary PtRuOsIr [79, 80], and PtRuIrSn [97, 98], because of their excellent behavior in MOR and removal of the intermediate species (CO) that form on the Pt surface site. But, the addition of the third and fourth metals in these ternary and quaternary catalysts is still unknown. Moreover, there are some limitations and challenges in producing the ternary and quaternary alloys. The optimization of catalyst morphology and catalyst compositions becomes difficult to be obtained because of many possible combinations of metals and compositions. However, many studies proved that the addition of third and fourth metal remarkably enhanced the catalytic activity, increase stability of catalyst, and good CO tolerance toward methanol electrooxidation and DMFC applications.
Tsiouvaras et al. [99] conducted the electrochemical measurement of PtRuMo/C catalysts and found that although all ternary catalysts were more active toward CO and methanol oxidation than the binary catalyst, the catalyst treated with H2 showed an improved performance by approximately 15% with respect to the ternary catalysts treated in He or with no treatment. In 2012, Hu et al. [100] successfully synthesized a superior bimetallic (PtNi) electrocatalyst, namely hollow mesoporous PtNi nanospheres (HMPNNs). The catalyst exhibited outstanding catalytic performance in the MOR with significantly enhanced Pt utilization efficiency because of the unique structure of HMPNNs and their large electrochemical surface area. While around 2016, work done by Yang et al. [101] also investigated the reactivity of synthesized bimetallic PtFe electrocatalysts in which they observed that the strong interaction between Pt and iron (Fe) metals can decrease adsorption energies of bimetallic NPs. They also found that the bimetallic PtFe nanoparticles prefer to be adsorbed on the single vacancy graphene through the Fe atoms when Pt and Fe atoms are both on the surfaces, because the interactions between Fe atoms and single vacancy graphene is stronger than those between Pt atoms and single vacancy graphene. Figure 3 illustrates the position of Pt and Fe particles dispersed on the graphene support as suggested by Yang et al. [101].
The position of PtFe catalyst on graphene support illustrated by Yang et al. [101]
Performance of Pt-Based Catalyst and Transition Metal Carbide
Transition metal carbide (TMC), with high mechanical and chemical stability against corrosion, good resistance to acidic environments, long-term stability, and high CO tolerance, can act as anode catalysts [88,89,90, 102,103,104]. In addition, TMCs also provide many advantages compared to their parent metals with respect to the activity, selectivity, and resistance to poison, for example tungsten carbide (WC) shows special properties, such as good electrical conductivity, resistance to acidic environments, low cost, and tolerance to CO poisoning in methanol electrooxidation process [88, 105, 106].
Wang et al. [103] reported the synthesis of high surface area (256 m2 g−1) tungsten carbide microspheres via a simple hydrothermal method. W2C was found as the main phase in the as-synthesized sample. Currently, researchers are currently exploring the potential of Pt supported on WC as an ideal catalyst for DMFC [38, 88, 107, 108]. Christian et al. [106] concluded that relative to their transition metal elements, TMCs behave such as noble metals such as Pt, Pd, Rh, and Ru for certain chemical and electrochemical reactions, including oxidation reaction of hydrogen, carbon monoxide, and alcohol and reduction of oxygen [109, 110]. In another study, Liu et al. [107] presented that molybdenum carbides (Mo-Carbides) could act as promoters for tungsten carbide and increase the electrocatalytic activity in the DMFC. However, without the incorporation of Pt metal, the electrocatalytic activity of pure WC toward the MOR for a DMFC system is still low. Therefore, a small amount of platinum metal added onto the WC component is very convenient to gain the advantage of the synergetic effect between Pt and WC [91, 111, 112]. Meanwhile, Hassan et al. [109] revealed that the common impurity (CO species) that forms during methanol oxidation has strong binding energy on the Pt surface; therefore, it must be oxidized so that it can be removed from the Pt active sites. The addition of WC component in Pt/WC electrocatalyst has shown high CO tolerance for MOR, which indicates the existence of synergetic effects between the Pt metal and WC as the support component. The study was also performed by another researcher by using less Pt metal to reduce the cost of Pt, while maintaining good electrocatalytic performance.
Other than that, the WC component is more active for the formation of a methoxy group (CH3O-) than pure Pt [113, 114]. CV performance of (Pt:Ru)4-WC/RGO shows outstanding catalytic performance with a current density of 330.11 mA mg−1 Pt compared to the other five catalysts, indicating that the as-synthesized electrocatalyst has excellent catalytic activity toward the MOR. In addition, the combination of Ru and WC on the Pt catalyst increased the OH surface amount and allowed the CO adsorbed on the Pt surface to be oxidized at lower potentials [39].
Performance of Pt-Based Catalyst and Transition Metal Nitride
Transition metal nitride (TMN) is an ideal candidate as a Pt catalyst support due to its good electrical conductivity (metallic), hardness, high electrochemical stability, and corrosion resistance under fuel cell operating conditions [115,116,117,118]. Transition metal nitrides, such as CrsN, TiN, and VN, supported Pt catalyst have been reported and showed high catalytic performance and better stability compared to the traditional carbon supports [112]. All transition metals can form nitride, except the second and third row of group 8, 9, and 10 metals (Ru, Os, Rh, Ir, Pd, and Pt). The behavior and structural properties of transition metal nitrides can be found in the literature [92,93,94]. Xiao et al. [112] prepared a titanium cobalt nitride-supported Pt electrocatalyst which showed excellent performance and stability toward the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR). The Ti0.9Co0.1N-supported Pt catalyst exhibited a small particle size and good metal dispersion. This prepared electrocatalyst also maintained the electrochemical surface area (ECSA) of Pt and greatly improved the ECSA preservation, with only a 35% decrease in the early ECSA drop after 10,000 ADT cycles. Cobalt doping significantly enhanced the ORR activity and durability. Meanwhile, a high performance and durable electrocatalyst in the DMFC system can be obtained using large surface area Pt(Ru)/TiN electrocatalyst, which also demonstrated high electrochemical activity toward MOR with a ∼ 52% improvement of catalytic activity and good stability/durability compared to commercial JM-Pt(Ru). Meanwhile, the DMFC’s single-cell performance achieved better maximum power density by 56% and demonstrated outstanding electrochemical stability for CSG-Pt(Ru)/TiN electrocatalyst [115].
Current research on Pt nanoparticles supported on titanium iron nitride nanotubes with hollow and porous structure and high surface area was synthesized by Li et al. [116]. It exhibited a significant increase in the electrocatalytic activity toward the MOR in acidic condition and had better durability. The reasons for these properties were due to their experimental data work that verified the addition of Fe can tune the electronic structure of Pt atoms, which contributes to the strengthened activity and stability of the Pt catalyst for the MOR. Meanwhile, in previous work done by Xiao et al. [117], Pt/Ti0.8Mo0.2N catalyst exhibited a porous structure and high surface area, small-size and well-dispersed Pt nanoparticles. This catalyst system preserved the intrinsic electrochemical stability of the TiN nanostructure and remarkably enhanced the MOR activity and durability. However, the currently available information on the electrochemical stability of tungsten nitride (WN) is still insufficient [109].
Meanwhile, MoxN (x = 1 or 2) on Ti substrate displayed electrochemical stability in an acidic electrolyte of 4.4 M H2SO4 up to anodic potential of + 0.67 V (vs. SHE) over 50 repeated cycles [110]. However, this electrocatalyst showed surface damage, such as cracking and crumbling, in the high cathodic (below − 0.1 V vs. SHE) and anodic (above + 0.67 V vs. SHE) potential regions due to cathodic and anodic corrosion, respectively. In the high anodic potential region above + 0.67 V (vs. SHE), the composition of oxygen increased due to MoOx oxide formation, which could cause deactivation. These results indicate that MoxN reacts with the oxygen species present in the aqueous electrolyte and is unstable above + 0.67 V (vs. SHE). Mustafha et al. [111] found that Pt loaded onto TiN as a support showed electroactivity for the methanol oxidation, with a high If/Ib ratio representing high CO resistance in the voltammogram performed at a scan rate of 20 mV/s in 0.5 M CH3OH + 0.5 M H2SO4 as the electrolyte. The bifunctional effect between Pt and TiN was cited as the cause of the CO resistance of Pt/TiN. In addition, Ottakam Thotiyl et al. [91] achieved good results for a Pt-loaded TiN catalyst, showing very good CO tolerance for the electrochemical oxidation of methanol. They concluded that the special characteristics of TiN that made it suitable as a Pt support for the MOR in an alkaline medium are that it shows exceptional stability, extreme corrosion resistance, good electronic conductivity, and strong adhesion behavior. TiN-supported catalysts are beneficial in terms of long-term stability, exchange current density, and stable currents at low overpotential. Platinum loadings of 40 wt% on TiN were used in the experiments.
In recent years, Liu et al. [118] successfully synthesized platinum on titanium nickel nitride decorated 3D carbon nanotubes which reduced graphene oxide (TiNiN/CNT-rGO) support by solvothermal process followed by nitriding process. Pt with small particle size is well-dispersed on TiNiN/CNT-rGO support. The 3D shape of CNT-rGO support gives a fast route for charge transfer and mass transfer as well as TiNiN NPs with good synergistic effect and the strong electronic coupling between different domains in TiNiN/CNT-rGO support. Thus, it greatly improved the catalytic activity of this catalyst. In another research, the non-carbon TiN nanotubes-supported Pt catalyst done by Xiao et al. [119] also displayed enhanced catalytic activity and durability toward MOR compared with the commercial Pt/C (E-TEK) catalyst.
Performance of Pt-Based Catalysts with Transition Metal Oxide
Pan et al. [92] reported the synthesis of platinum–antimony-doped tin oxide nanoparticles supported on carbon black (CB) as anode catalysts in DMFC, which exhibited better improvement in catalytic activity toward MOR compared to Pt-SnO2/C or commercial Pt/C electrocatalyst. The enhancement in activity was attributed to the high electrical conductivity of Sb-doped SnO2, which induced electronic effects with the Pt catalysts. Another work done by Abida et al. [93]described the preparation of Pt/TiO2 nanotube catalysts for methanol electrooxidation. The TiO2 nanotubes-supported Pt catalyst (Pt/TiO2 nanotubes) exhibited excellent catalytic activity toward MOR and had good CO tolerance. They also reported that the use of hydrogenotitanate nanotubes as a substrate for the Pt catalyst considerably improved the COads oxidation on Pt, but the MOR still occurred at high potential. Then, several years later, Wu et al. [94] synthesized Pt-C/TiO2 with MOR activity 1.6 higher than commercial Pt-C and the stability of Pt-C/TiO2 was also enhanced by 6.7 times compared to Pt-C. The excellent performance of this catalyst was a contribution of mesopores and partially coated carbon support. Zhou et al. [95] prepared hollow mesoporous tungsten trioxide microspheres (HMTTS) using the spray-drying method to yield Pt/HMTTS. The electrocatalyst exhibited excellent electrocatalytic activity and high stability toward MOR than Pt/C and Pt/WO3 electrocatalysts, which may be attributed to the well-ordered Pt particles (with an average size of 5 nm) on the HMTTS surface. Wu et al. [120] used polystyrene spheres as templates to obtain pore-arrayed WO3 (p-WO3). The Pt nanoparticles with an approximate size of 3.3 nm dispersed on pore-arrayed WO3 (Pt/p-WO3) exhibited high catalytic activity toward MOR.
Li et al. [121] used Sn-doped TiO2-modified carbon-supported Pt (Pt/Ti0.9Sn0.1O2–C) as an electrocatalyst for a DMFC system. The synthesized Pt/Ti0.9Sn0.1O2–C electrocatalyst revealed high catalytic activity and CO tolerance toward MOR. The enhanced catalyst activity was due to the high content of OH groups on the Ti0.9Sn0.1O2 electrocatalyst sample and the strengthened metals and support interactions. In addition, Lv et al. [122] also reported in their work that the addition of TiO2 could not only facilitate CO removal and hinder CO formation on Pt surface during methanol oxidation, but it can also prevent the agglomeration and corrosion of Pt, which can be concluded from strong metal-supports interaction between TiO2–C and Pt. Huang et al. [123] revealed that a TiO2-coated carbon nanotube support for Pt electrocatalysts could be prepared via a one-step synthesis. Hao et al. [124] developed a new catalyst composed of Pt nanoparticles deposited on graphene with MoO3. These catalysts exhibited high catalytic activity toward MOR and high resistance to CO species. However, the size of MoO3 must be tuned by controlling the metal oxide loading.
The selection of metal oxide such as MnO, RuO, CeO, SnO2, MgO, and V2O5 as additional component in electrocatalyst of Pt because of their low cost, good electrochemical properties, and have proton-electron intercalation properties [125]. From the catalytic activity aspect, it can be summarized that the addition of these metal oxides can enhance the electrocatalytic activity of DMFC and other fuel cells. The incorporation of these conducting metal oxides together with Pt catalyst could also facilitate the oxidation process of CO intermediate molecules. Hence, these types of metal have high potential to be used together with platinum as anode electrode.
Carbon support
To improve the utilization of the Pt catalysts, the carbon support is also another useful approach to be used together with Pt. Carbon materials are largely used as catalyst support because of its special properties such as relatively stable in both acid and basic electrolyte, good conductivity, and provide high surface area for dispersion of metal catalyst. It is believed that carbon materials have a strong effect that can influence the electrocatalysts properties such as metal particle size, morphology, metal dispersion, alloyed degree, and stability. Carbon supports can also affect the performance of supported catalysts in fuel cells, such as mass transport and catalyst layer electronic conductivity, electrochemical active area, and metal nanoparticle stability during the operation.
Currently, a great concern of the development in the nanotechnology field, especially carbon nanomaterials synthesis, is to create more stable and active supported catalysts. Support materials of nanoparticles are believed to be the most promising materials for catalytic activity in fuel cells, including the DMFC system. Pt has been traditionally used as nobel catalysts for many fuel cells application [126,127,128]. However, the high cost and low reserve are hindering commercialization of fuel cells and driving researchers to make the utmost of the catalyst. According to this problem, the major effort has been done toward nanoscaling of the catalyst nanoparticles to form more active sites per mass unit. The morphology, structure, and activity of the catalyst, and correspondingly the whole lifetime of a cell, thus strongly depend on the catalyst support [129]. Table 2 shows the preparation, physical properties, performance, and activity of Pt-based supported carbon done by groups of researchers. The details of Pt-based supported carbon will be performed in the following sections: “Graphene Support” to “Carbon Nanocoils”.
Graphene support
Graphene has many extraordinary properties; it exists as a two-dimensional carbon (2-D) form, which is called a crystalline allotrope, one-atom-thick planar flat sheet of sp2 tightly bonded carbon atoms with a thickness of 0.34 nm. Its carbon atoms are packed in a regular atomic-scale chicken wire (hexagonal) pattern [92, 119]. The theoretical specific surface area of graphene is 2630 m2 g−1, which is much larger than that of carbon black (typically less than 900 m2 g−1) and carbon nanotubes (100 to 1000 m2 g−1) and similar to that of activated carbon [130]. Graphene has high potential as a metal support [131, 132, 133] [33] due to its high surface area [134] for better catalyst/metal dispersion [135], high electrical conductivity [136], and good thermal properties [137, 138]. Moreover, the functionality of graphene support can be modified by changing it surface structure, and hence contribute to its potential applications, such as in fuel cells, energy storage, electrochemistry, supercapacitors, and batteries [138,139,140,141,142]. Figure 4 illustrates the preparation steps to obtain the graphene nanosheets (GNS), while Fig. 5 shows their TEM images [143]. It can be clearly observed that the thickness of the GO with many typical wrinkles obviously decreases compared to graphite. This can be explained by the presence of the rich oxygen-containing functional groups over the surface of GO [132]. Besides, both resulting GN-900 and GN-900-C contained of a large size of nanosheets structure, but the GN-900-C comprised more transparent than the GN-900.
illustration of the preparation of graphite oxide to graphene nanosheets (GNS) by using oxalic acid [143]
TEM images of graphite (a), GO (b), GN-900 (c), and GN-900-C [143]
The discovery of graphene sheets began around 2000 by mechanical extracting process from 3D graphite source [133]. Graphene can be obtained by several synthesis methods such as hydrothermal [144], chemical reduction [143], chemical vapor deposition, and electrochemical. Ma et al. [145] enhanced the electrocatalytic activity of Pt nanoparticles by supporting the Pt nanoparticles on functionalized graphene for DMFC. Functionalized graphene was prepared by methyl viologen (MV) and Pt/MV–rGO electrocatalyst was synthesized by a facile wet chemical method. They also reported that the higher catalytic activity of Pt/MV–RGO was attributed to the synergetic effect between MV and rGO.
Meanwhile, Zhang et al. [146] modified the graphene support with graphene nanosheets through Hummer’s method, followed by polymerization of aniline (as nitrogen source). The TEM images for Pt/NCL-RGO and Pt/RGO electrocatalysts show that the aggregation between separated graphene sheets was decreased by nitrogen-doped carbon layer (NCL), leading to a better dispersion of the Pt catalyst on the graphene nanosheets support and better electroactivity and stability toward methanol electrooxidation (MOR). Presence of NCL successfully prevented the aggregation of graphene nanosheets as the Pt nanoparticles supporting material.
In 2011, Qiu et al. [135] successfully synthesized nanometer-sized Pt catalyst via sodium borohydride reduction method with an average particle size of only 4.6 nm. These Pt nanoparticles showed an even dispersion of Pt catalyst on graphene oxide support and very high electrocatalytic activity toward MOR by controlling the percent deposition of Pt loaded on the graphene. In another study conducted by Ojani et al. [147], for synthesized Pt-Co/graphene electrocatalyst, it was shown that graphene nanosheets improved the electrocatalytic behavior and long-term stability of the electrode. In addition, the Pt-Co/G/GC electrocatalyst showed great stability toward MOR. The catalytic performance toward MOR can also be improved by using cobalt core–platinum shell nanoparticles supported on surface functionalized graphene [148]. This enhanced catalytic activity could be attributed to the poly (diallyldimethylammonium chloride) (PDDA) that plays a crucial role for dispersion and stabilization of Co@Pt catalyst on graphene support. PDDA-functionalized graphene provided the higher electrochemical active surface area [149, 150]. Huang et al. [138] also studied a PtCo-graphene electrocatalyst with outstanding catalytic performance and high CO tolerance toward the MOR, which far outperformed Pt-graphene and PtCo-MWCNT electrocatalysts with the same ratio of Pt and carbon content. Figure 4 shows the formation of a graphene-PtCo catalyst prepared from a graphite source. Sharma et al. [57] synthesized Pt/reduced graphene oxide (Pt/RGO) electrocatalyst using a microwave-assisted polyol process, which sped up the reduction of GO and formation of Pt nanocrystals. They compared Pt/RGO to a commercial carbon support (Pt/C), which exhibited high CO tolerance, high electrochemically active surface area, and high electrocatalytic activity for the MOR. In a previous study, Zhao et al. [139] reported that the unique 3D-structured Pt/C/graphene aerogel (Pt/C/GA) exhibited greater stability toward MOR with no decrease in electrocatalytic activity. Moreover, the Pt/C/graphene aerogel also exhibited significantly higher stability to scavenge crossover methanol at high potential in an acidic solution compared with the commercial Pt/C electrocatalyst. At the initial catalytic stage, the Pt/C electrocatalyst lost approximately 40% after 1000 CV cycles. In contrast, the Pt/C/graphene aerogel only lost 16% of the initial catalytic activity. After 200 cycles of CV, the current density of Pt/C/graphene aerogel was much higher with a remarkably higher stability than that of Pt/C electrocatalyst. Meanwhile, Yan et al. [151] demonstrated highly active mesoporous graphene-like nanobowls supported Pt catalyst with high surface area of 1091 m2 g−1, high pore volume of 2.7 cm3 g−1, and average pore diameter of 9.8 nm obtained by applying a template synthesis method. In addition, the Pt/graphene bowls also achieved high performance toward MOR with a current density value of 2075 mA mgPt−1, which was 2.87 times higher than that of commercial Pt/C (723 mA mgPt−1). The onset potential for the Pt/graphene bowls toward methanol electrooxidation was negatively shifted by approximately 160 mV compared with that to the latter and showed CO resistance. Figure 6 shows the proposed schematic for the formation of PtCo catalyst on reduced-GO (rGO) support [51]. It is described that the formation of graphene oxide nanosheets from oxidation of graphite powder leads to the increase in interlayer “d” spacing of stacked graphitic sheets from 0.34 to 0.78 nm due to the presence of various oxygen-containing functional groups. The oxygen-containing functional groups act as anchor sites for the well-dispersed Pt and PtCo nanoparticles on rGO sheets, and used for efficient electrooxidation of methanol.
Illustrates the schematic formation of graphene supported Pt-Co catalyst [51]
We can conclude that the reduce graphene oxide (rGO), graphene, modified graphene as supporting material exhibited high electrocatalytic activity toward methanol electrooxidation process. A lot of studies have been reported related to the particle size distribution and size, morphologies, and catalytic activities of Pt and Pt alloys using graphene as supporting material, which showed great improvement in fuel cell performance as mentioned and discussed above. Thus, graphene support can be further studied for better fuel cell performance.
Multiwall Carbon Nanotube and Single-Wall Carbon Nanotube Support
Several years ago, Jha et al. [140] prepared multiwall carbon nanotube (MWCNTs) via chemical vapor deposition using an AB3 alloy hydride catalyst. Platinum-supported MWCNT (Pt/MWCNT) and platinum-ruthenium-supported MWCNT (Pt-Ru/MWCNT) electrocatalysts were prepared by chemical reduction. The performance of these electrodes was studied at different temperatures, and the results demonstrated a very high power density of 39.3 mW cm−2 at a current density of 130 mA cm−2, which could be attributed to the dispersion and accessibility of the MWCNT support and Pt-Ru in the electrocatalyst mixture for the methanol oxidation reaction. This was also done by other researchers that using different catalyst supported MWCNT for DMFC system [152,153,154,155]. Meanwhile, Wu and Xu [156] compared MWCNT-supported Pt and single-wall carbon nanotube (SWCNT)-supported Pt. Figure 7 shows that the TEM images of Pt catalyst was deposited on MWNT and SWNT electrodes through the electrodeposition technique. The Pt particles in Pt-SWNT (Fig. 7b) looked closer contact with the network of entangled and branched bundles of SWNT support, and the shape is closer to highly exposed sphere. The benefits of the SWCNT support are due to its greater electrochemical surface-active area and easier charge transfer at the electrode/electrolyte interface because of the graphitic crystallinity structure, rich amount of oxygen-containing surface functional groups, and highly mesoporous and unique 3D-structure of SWNT. The electrodeposition technique carried out by them contributed to higher utilization and more uniform dispersion of Pt particles on its support.
TEM images for the Pt on MWCNT(a) and SWCNT (b) [156]
Then, Wang et al. [157] reported the high performance of modified PtAu/MWCNT@TiO2 electrocatalyst prepared via deposition-UV-photoreduction for DMFC, which also exhibited high CO tolerance. Zhao et al. [126] studied 3D flower-like platinum-ruthenium (PtRu) and platinum-ruthenium-nickel (PtRuNi) alloy nanoparticle clusters on MWCNTs prepared via a three-step process, and the best ratios obtained from their experiments for the PtRu and PtRuNi alloys were 8:2 and 8:1:1, respectively. Another group, i.e., Zhao et al. [158], found a higher current density toward MOR and better activity for MWCNT-supported PtWC compared with Pt/C electrocatalyst. These results were attributed to the factors of the synergistic effect between the Pt catalyst and the WC component, high CO tolerance from the bifunctional effect of the Pt catalyst and the WC component, and strong interaction between metals and WC in the electrocatalyst composite.
As a summary, both of MWCNT and SWNT support in terms of structural, surface, and electrochemical properties have their own characteristics as supporting material that remarkably enhanced their performance in catalysis of methanol oxidation process. However, as a comparison, SWCNT possess a high degree of graphitization, highly mesoporous 3D structure, and contain more oxygen-containing functional groups at its surface sites. In relation with these properties, the SWCNT exhibits a higher electrochemically accessible surface area and faster charge transfer rate at the electrode/electrolyte interface.
Carbon Nanotube Support
Wen et al. [144] proposed that carbon nanotubes (CNTs) support could improve fuel cell performance; for example, Pt can be fixed to the inner wall and the outer wall of CNTs and may cause improvement in the electrocatalytic properties of platinum-CNTs. Yoshitake et al. [159] proposed that fuel cells using CNTs as the catalyst support produced larger current densities. The addition of binary or other components to the electrocatalysts for methanol electrooxidation overcomes the problems related to catalyst poisoning caused by CO during the reaction. Therefore, new electrocatalyst carbon supports, such as carbon nanotubes [160, 161], are being actively developed to significantly improve fuel cell performance. Kakati et al. [128] successfully synthesis the PtRu on CNT/SnO2 for anode catalyst DMFC via hydrothermal process. It has been found that the presence of SnO2 provide a high durability property for the catalyst and the presence of SnO2 in the district of Pt could supply oxygen-containing functional groups for the removal of CO intermediate molecules from the Pt surface sites during electrooxidation of methanol. Generally, the decomposition methanol occurs at Pt surface sites; meanwhile, the decomposition of water occurs at SnO2 surface sites to form oxygen-containing species which then react with CO intermediate molecules. However, as support material, the conductivity property of SnO2 still needs to be enhanced. Kakati et al. [128] also proposed the schematic diagram of the formation of PtRu on CNT/SnO2 composite as shows in Fig. 8, and FESEM images of CNT/SnO2 composite support (a and b) and PtRu/SnO2/CNT composite electrocatalyst (c and d) in Fig. 9.
Illustrates the schematic diagram for the formation of PtRu/SnO2/CNT composite [128]
Chien et al. [127] proposed that the high catalytic performance of Pt-Ru/CNT for MOR can be attributed to the presence of CNT as the carbon support material with several factors: (i) the as-synthesized Pt-Ru/CNT electrocatalyst owns the ideal nanosized particles and composition to increase catalytic activity, (ii) the presence of functional group on the CNT surface results in high hydrophilicity of CNT, which produces better electrochemical reaction on the electrode area, and (iii) the high electronic conductivity of the CNT support lowers the resistance in MOR. Jeng et al. [150] prepared Pt-Ru/CNT electrocatalyst via a modified polyol with a PtRu composition ratio of 1:1, exhibiting high catalytic activity toward MOR and better performance than that of commercial PtRu/C. Show et al. [162] reported that Pt catalyst with a size of less than 10 nm can be obtained by dispersing the Pt particles on a CNT surface using the in-liquid plasma method, and excellent performance was demonstrated by the electrical power achieving 108 mW cm−2 [162]. The in-liquid plasma method was also used by Matsuda et al. [163] that can applied to obtain nanometer-sized Pt catalyst on support material that remarkably enhanced the fuel cell performance.
To be concluded, high electric conductivity, large surface area, excellent chemical and electrochemical stabilities, quasi one-dimensional structure, and good morphology as the supporting materials are the key factors of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) in enhancing the DMFC performance. In addition, carbon support materials such as CNTs which contribute a large effect on metal distribution and size have also been proven to be an essential to the electrocatalysts to achieve high catalytic activity during methanol oxidation process.
Carbon Nanofiber Support
Steigerwalt et al. [164] reported the successful synthesis of PtRu alloy that was widely dispersed on a graphene carbon nanofiber (CNF) support as an electrocatalyst in DMFC. The catalytic activity was enhanced by ~ 50% relative to that recorded for an unsupported PtRu colloid anode electrocatalyst. Meanwhile, Wang et al. [152] reported that Pt/CNF nanocomposites obtained by the reduction of hexachloroplatinic acid (H2PtCl6) precursor with formic acid (HCOOH) in aqueous solution containing electrospun CNFs at room temperature showed a higher current density than other prepared Pt/CNFs and was approximately 3.5 times greater than that of the E-TEK Pt/C electrocatalyst. Another research carried out by Giorgi et al. [153] described a CNF and bimetallic PtAu electrode with a single layer and both diffusive and catalytic functions using a decreased noble metal amount (approximately five times less) with a consequent large cost reduction. In addition, the bifunctional electrocatalytic properties were also active for the MOR on the PtAu nanoparticle catalysts [154]. Calderón et al. [155] reported PtRu/CNF prepared via reduction using sodium borohydride (NaBH4), methanol, and formate ions. This electrocatalyst synthesized by SFM was heat-treated (denoted as SFM TT), which improved its electrocatalytic activity during MOR. Later, Maiyalagan [165] reported that the addition of silicotungstic acid acted as a stabilizer for the PtRu particles on CNT support. The PtRu-supported CNT was prepared by microwave heating of an ethylene glycol (EG) solution of STA, H2PtCl6.6H2O (as Pt precursor), and RuCl3.xH2O (as Ru precursor) with CNF suspended in the solution. The Pt and Ru precursors were loaded on CNF by conventional impregnation method. The results revealed that the PtRu nanoparticles are uniformly dispersed on carbon nanofiber support, with an average particle size of 3.9 nm enhanced the catalytic activity toward methanol electrooxidation. As a conclusion, the carbon nanotubes supporting material with high electronic conductivity and high surface area gives an advantage of better dispersion for the Pt or Pt alloys deposition. The higher the surface area of supporting material can reduce the agglomeration of metal particles on it, thus can produce better catalyst morphology for better fuel cell performance.
Mesoporous Carbon Support
Mesoporous carbon (MPC) support is another ideal candidate as an electrocatalyst support material in DMFC and fuel cell. Generally, mesoporous carbons are divided into two classes based on their structures which are ordered mesoporous carbons (OMCs), with highly ordered pore structure and uniform pore size, nonordered mesoporous carbons with irregular pores. Other than that, OPC can be produced by using high quality of SBA-15 silica and sucrose as carbon source template. To prepare the high quality of SBA-15 SBA-15 sample, triblock copolymer, EO20-PO70EO20 (Pluronic P123, BASF), as the surfactant and tetraethyl orthosilicate (TEOS, 98%, Acros) as the silica source are used, as reported by literature [166,167,168]. The synthesis of MPC starts from synthesis of SBA-15, followed by calcination process.
A well-dispersed and ultralow Pt catalyst (PtFe) supported on ordered mesoporous carbon (OMC) was prepared via a simple route and showed superior catalytic activity. The PtFe alloy with a size range of 3–5 nm was homogeneously dispersed on the CMS with a very high specific surface area of more than 1000 m2 g−1 [169]. The incorporation of Fe was discussed in the previous section (“Performance of Various Types of Pt-Based Catalysts” section and “Performance of Pt-Based Alloys” section). The high specific surface area of mesoporous carbon support can be produced by carbonization process of a resorcinol-formaldehyde polymer with a cationic polyelectrolyte as a soft template [160]. The performance of Pt/MPC also related to the synthesis/preparation method as done by Kuppan and Selvam. Kuppan and Selvam [167] synthesized four type of Pt/mesoporous carbon by using different reducing agent which are NaBH4, EG, hydrogen, and paraformaldehyde. From there, the Pt/mesoporous carbon synthesized using paraformaldehyde as reducing agent for showed highest current density. The highest in catalytic was attributed to the use of paraformaldehyde that gives the smallest Pt particle size (4.5 nm), and the highest ECSA (84 m2/g) belongs to Pt/mesoporous carbon.
Wang et al. [161] synthesized a Pt@WC/OMC electrocatalyst composite, in which the composite was platinized using a pulsed microwave-assisted polyol technique. The OMC produced in this synthesis exhibited high surface area property. The Pt@WC/OMC electrocatalyst also showed high activity, desirable stability, and CO tolerance toward MOR. In another work done by Zhang et al. [170], the ordered CMS had a unique hierarchical nanostructure (with a 3-D structure) with ordered large mesopores and macropores that facilitated the dispersion of Pt nanoparticles and rapid mass transport during the reactions.
To maximize the use of Pt particles, the support materials should have uniform dispersion, high utilization efficiency, and desirable activity and stability. Moreover, the good supporting materials must be suitable for surface chemistry, high loading of Pt dispersion, and some functional roles. Additionally, based on the previous studies as discussed above, the ordered mesoporous carbons with large pore sizes are highly desirable for fast mass transfer and, thus, enhance the catalytic activity especially in the reaction involve large reactants molecules.
Carbon Black
Carbon black (CB) is one of the commercial carbon support that has been used till now. There are many types of CB such as Vulcan XC-72, Black Pearl 2000, Denka Black, Shawinigan Black, Ketjen EC-300J, etc. [171, 172]. CB is commonly used as a carbon support material for electrocatalysts because it possesses high porosity properties, which make it suitable as a potential support material for the catalyst layer in PEMFCs and DMFCs as reported in provided literatures [173,174,175,176,177,178,179,180]. The comparison of the several carbon black support was reported by Wang et al. [181] who investigated the effect on DMFC performance using several types of carbon black such as Vulcan XC-72R, Ketjen Black EC 300J, and Black Pearls 2000 carbon black as additives/support for the Pt cathode catalyst. From the experiments, the results showed that Ketjen Black EC 300J was the most useful carbon support for increasing the electrochemical surface area and DMFC performance of the cathode catalyst.
Nowadays, CB is commercial carbon support for many fuel cell systems. Generally, it is used for the comparison with new or modified catalyst [125]. The following Table 3 summarizes the commercial carbon black and its properties for fuel cell application. There are so many modifications among carbon support materials and development of new carbon support for enhance fuel cell performance; however, commercial carbon black still is used in many fuel cell applications especially for the comparison with new or modified catalyst.
Carbon Nanocoils
Celorrio et al. [182] proposed carbon nanocoils (CNCs) as a PtRu support in their experiment, indicating that the electrocatalyst performance was strongly dependent on the synthesis method. CNC-supported electrocatalysts showed better electrochemical behavior than E-TEK electrocatalysts, and better electrocatalytic behaviors toward CO and methanol oxidation were achieved using CNC as a support material [182]. Sevilla et al. obtained highly graphitic CNCs from the catalytic graphitization of carbon spherules via the hydrothermal treatment of different saccharides which are sucrose, glucose, and starch [183]. They demonstrated that the high electrocatalytic activity of the CNCs is due to the combination of good electrical conductivity of their graphitic structure and high porosity property, which allows much less diffusional resistance of reactants/products. Two years later, Sevilla et al. [184] reported highly dispersed Pt nanoparticles on graphitic CNCs with diameters in the range of 3.0–3.3 nm and a very fine particle size distribution. The electrocatalyst possessed large active Pt surface area (up to 85 m2 g−1 Pt), high catalytic activity toward MOR (up to 201 A g−1 Pt), and high resistance against oxidation, which was noticeably greater than that of the Pt/Vulcan electrocatalyst. Celorrio et al. [185] obtained Pt/CNC electrocatalysts via the impregnation method, which showed that a combination of Pt and CNCs facilitated the CO oxidation process.
Conductive Polymer Supports
Choi et al. [186] synthesized PtRu alloy nanoparticles with two types of conducting polymers, i.e., poly(N-vinyl carbazole) and poly(9-(4-vinyl-phenyl)carbazole), as the anode electrodes. Electrochemical and DMFC tests showed that these nanocomposite electrocatalysts were beneficial in a DMFC system, but their catalytic performance was still lower than that of a carbon supported electrode. Thus, they suggested that higher electrical conductivity of the polymer and lower catalyst loss are required in nanocomposite electrodes to achieve better performance in a DMFC. Choi et al. [171] and Kim et al. [172] prepared polyaniline (PANi) as a support material for PtRu catalyst in a DMFC system. PANi is a group of conductive polymers with high electronic conductivity and a methanol oxidation current similar to that of carbon-supported PtRu catalyst. Then, Kim et al. [172] conducted catalytic tests to compare PtRu/PANi support with PtRu/carbon support, showing that the enhanced catalytic activity of PtRu/PANi was due to (i) the high electrical conductivity of the polyaniline support, (ii) the increase of electrochemical surface area of the prepared electrocatalyst, and (iii) the higher ion diffusion behavior. In another study, Amani et al. [74] synthesized PtSn supported by C-PANI as an electrocatalyst with different Pt:Sn atomic ratios using the impregnation method. The PtSn/C-PANI electrocatalyst with a ratio of 30:70 showed outstanding performance in the methanol electrooxidation, and the current density was approximately 40% higher than PtRu/C and 50% higher than Pt/C-PANi. The CO tolerance and stability were improved compared to that of PtRu/C, and the methanol crossover was reduced. Yaldagard et al. [173] studied the electrocatalytic performance of Pt/PANi/WC/C electrocatalyst for methanol electrooxidation (MOR) and oxygen electro-reduction (ORR), and it exhibited higher MOR activity, high CO resistance, and improved stability compared to Pt/C electrocatalyst in the presence of methanol.
Wu et al. [174] presented polypyrrole nanowire networks (PPNNs) as the anodic microporous layers (MPLs) of passive DMFC. In passive DMFC system, the novel MPL achieved a 28.3% increase in the power density from 33.9 to 43.5 mW cm−2 compared with the conventional layer with a similar PtRu (1:1). The high performance was due to the presence of PPNNs, which expressively improved the catalyst utilization and mass transfer of methanol on the anode. Besides, Selvaraj and Alagar [175] prepared Pt-Ru nanoparticle-decorated polypyrrole/multiwalled carbon nanotubes (Ppy/CNT) via the in situ polymerization of Ppy on CNTs containing ammonium peroxydisulphate (NH4)S2O8 as an oxidizing agent at the temperature range of 0–5 °C, followed by deposition of Pt particles on PPy-CNT composite films via chemical reduction to produce Pt/PPy-CNT. It was found that the PtRu particles deposited on PPy–CNT composite films exhibited higher catalytic activity and stability toward MOR compared to Pt/PPy-CNT. So far, the investigation on polymer as supporting materials is not much as carbon support materials. From aspect as supporting materials, the performance of polymer support was not good/excellent as carbon support. Further studies are needed in the future for better electrocatalytic activity and DMFC performance.
Problems and Limitations of Using Pt for DMFC Systems
There are two major challenges in the development of new DMFC catalysts: (i) performance, including the catalytic activity, reliability, and durability; and (ii) catalyst cost reduction. Two major problems arise in DMFC when using pure Pt alone as the anode catalysts: (1) slower kinetics oxidation of methanol, even on some state-of-the-art anode catalysts, and methanol crossover through the membrane, which not only lowers cathode performance but also reduces fuel efficiency. To develop successful fuel cell technology, including DMFC technology, new catalysts must be investigated to improve the performance and reduce the cost. Reduction of the catalyst cost remains a major challenge. Currently, platinum is one of the most effective electrocatalysts for DMFC due to its high catalytic activity for methanol oxidation, but because it is a precious metal, platinum usage is challenging and limited [176, 177]. Therefore, many scientists have attempted to find materials that can behave like Pt catalysts. One problem with the MOR in DMFCs is that CO is produced as an intermediate reaction product when using Pt catalyst and has strong binding energy on platinum particles, poisoning the active sites of the platinum surface area [58]. Therefore, CO must be removed by oxidizing it from the Pt surface using another material with high resistance to CO poisoning. For example, Hwu et al. proposed Pt-modified WC catalyst that has remarkable resistance to CO poisoning [178]. On the other hand, they also suggested that CO tolerance originates from the lower CO desorption temperature on pure and Pt-modified WC compared to pure Pt.
There are many solutions that can be applied to reduce the cost of Pt, overcome or minimize the formation of CO species during methanol oxidation, and increase the kinetics of methanol oxidation, such as alloying with other metals or transition metals, the incorporation of metals, metal nitrides, and metal oxides and the use of carbon supports as discussed in this paper. However, to overcome this problem, we need to understand the formation of CO on Pt sites particle, and understanding of the mechanism of the anode reaction in DMFCs. Unfortunately, it has limited amount of mechanistic insight to be studied, because this reactions involve complex mechanism path with many possible intermediate molecules and also competing reaction pathways [179]. For Pt catalytic mechanism, it has been suggested by a direct reaction path. Unfortunately, the use of Pt on other metals has limited mechanistic information available. Figure 10 represents the reaction path for methanol electrooxidation and their possible intermediates molecules formed during the process. Black arrows show direct path, while green arrows show the indirect mechanism for CO2 formation as a final product. In the direct mechanism, the reaction path does not involve a CO intermediate, and CO2 is formed directly from methanol. In contrast, indirect mechanism forming a CO intermediate molecule and subsequently it is oxidized to CO2 product. Notably, CO is the most stable molecule of all the intermediates on Pt during MOR. The stability of CO causes it to be a main reason for the extensive CO poisoning problem that is often found on Pt catalyst.
First step in the mechanism of methanol decomposition reaction on Pt is the activation of methanol molecule. It can take place via hydrogen abstraction from either the carbon or the oxygen atoms. Further step, hydrogen abstraction creates formaldehyde (CH2O) or hydroxymethylene (CHOH), followed by formyl (CHO) or COH. In the direct mechanism, instead of stripping off the final hydrogen from CHO or COH molecule to CO, a water molecule will release a proton/electron pair and resulting to OH species that can further bind with the carbonaceous species to form dihydroxycarbene (C(OH)2) or formic acid (HCOOH). This step is called hydroxyl addition process. The next step is followed by dehydrogenation to form either formate (HCOO) or carboxyl (COOH) molecule, with subsequent dehydrogenation to form CO2 as the final product of reaction. In addition, an alternative direct mechanism involve the stripping of a proton/electron pair from water and addition of the resulting hydroxyl to CH2O, subsequently to H2COOH, which then undergoes dehydrogenation to form HCOOH or dioxymethylene (HsCOO). The HsCOO molecule can then undergoes dehydrogenation to HCOO and finally to CO2. Besides, in the indirect mechanism, CHO or COH species are directly dehydrogenated to CO. Water is dissociated separately on the surface to form OH, and the two surface species react together to form CO2 gas in a way similar to the water-gas-shift reaction [187]. This indirect mechanism occurs because less energy is required to form CO than CO2. Strong adsorbed CO intermediate form on the Pt surface sites revealed a major problem at the anode site of DMFC. Formation of this intermediate species can cause deactivation Pt catalyst. Furthermore, the rate of kinetic methanol oxidation for DMFC is slower. Therefore, to increase the resistance of Pt catalyst to CO poisoning on the electrodes, Pt alloy or hybrids, such as PtRu, PtSn, PtMO, PtPb, PtFe, PtCo, PtNi, PtRuOs, PtRuMo, PtRuSn, PtRuNi, etc. (as mentioned and discussed in “Performance of various types of Pt-based catalysts” section), are usually employed as electrocatalyst materials on DMFC anodes. Addition/incorporation of these alloys to Pt can prevent the adoption of CO on Pt surface by decreasing the oxidation overpotential of the anode [84].
Conclusion and Prospects
Great progress has been made in recent years in the development and optimization of new catalysts using Pt-based catalysts and carbon and conductive polymer supports for DMFC anode catalyst. Some new carbon materials, such as nano- or mesostructured carbons, have been demonstrated as highly potential catalyst support materials, although their applications face challenges in terms of synthesis, metal loading, and electrode preparation. The combination of platinum as the best metal catalyst for DMFC and an excellent carbon support could produce breakthroughs in the investigation of a new DMFC anode catalyst in the future. Since platinum is an expensive metal, it is necessary to reduce the amount of Pt used in the electrocatalyst. Therefore, this paper presented more than 100 studies on the electrocatalytic activity and performance related to Pt-based electrocatalysts and various carbon and conductive polymer supports. The main problems related to the platinum electrocatalyst, such as carbon monoxide formation during the methanol oxidation reaction and the poor kinetics of methanol oxidation, could be overcome using additional materials and various supports, as reported in the research presented in this paper.
Many studies conducted in the recent years to reduce the loading amount of Pt catalyst and to increase the percentage utilization efficiency, and hence, enhance the electrocatalytic activity of Pt toward the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) and methanol electrooxidation reaction (MOR), were discussed in this paper. Pt has been alloyed with many transition metals such as Fe, Co, Ni, Ir, Ru, Rh, and Pd, resulting in higher catalytic activity for the DMFC system. The incorporation of these materials also resulted in good dispersion on the carbon and polymer supports, which showed higher performance in the DMFC test compared to the use of Pt metal alone. Various carbon support sources, namely activated carbon (AC), carbon black (CB), multiwall carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs), carbon nanofibers (CNFs), carbon nanotubes (CNTs), graphene, and conductive polymer supports, have been used with Pt-based catalysts to improve their catalytic performance. Additionally, Pt-based alloy catalysts have been designed as hollow mesoporous PtNi, nanowire PtRu, and nanodendritic PtRh, which showed improved electrocatalytic activity and superior electrocatalytic performance. Meanwhile, 3-D Pt/C/graphene aerogel demonstrated enhanced stability toward methanol electrooxidation. The work performed by researchers showed that the electrocatalytic activities of nanoparticles Pt alloy catalysts depend on several factors such as the synthesis method, condition of experiments (such as temperature and pH), alloy composition/ratio, precursors, and thermal treatment. For the future study, it should be extended to the optimization of the geometry and structure of previous studies that revealed active Pt alloys can increase their electrocatalytic activity and stability and the application of support materials for fuel cell applications. For example, current research that have been done by Liu et al. 2017 [188] shows the excellent performance of platinum. From theoretical calculations, it revealed that the main effective sites on platinum single atom electrocatalysts are single-pyridinic-nitrogen-atom-anchored single-platinum-atom centers, which ascribed to the tolerant CO in MOR. They also suggested that carbon black supported used together with Pt single atom is effective in cost, efficient, and durable electrocatalyst for fuel cell application. According to the above study, herein, we can conclude that the modification on structure and morphology of precious metal such as platinum could also remarkably increase the performance of electrocatalyst, but in the same time can reduce the overall cost of fuel cell for commercialization.
To improve the morphologies of Pt and Pt alloys, carbon support material also need further study. Nanoporous metals become an interesting part of catalyst to be studied for fuel cell application. It is determined very suitable for fuel cell catalysts because they possess high surface area, three-dimensional (3D) network structures with adjustable ligament/pore sizes suitable for mass transport, and electron conduction. Around 2017, Li et al. successfully carried out modification on Pt-Pd-Au trimetallic surface as cathode for oxygen reduction reaction [189]. The surface evolution of 3-D Pt-Pd-Au trimetallic greatly enhanced the ORR activity and highly stable as ORR catalyst. The modification of PtNi alloy also done by Li et al. 2016 [190] showed ultrafine jagged platinum nanowire with highly large ECSA that exhibits enhanced mass activity of ~ 50 times higher than state-of-the-art commercial Pt/C catalyst, while Bu et al. 2016 [191] reported highly uniform PtPb/Pt core/shell nanoplate with biaxially strain extremely active, stable for anodic oxidation reactions, and great performance compared to commercial Pt/C in both methanol oxidation reaction (MOR) and ethanol oxidation reaction (EOR). Since the nanostructured platinum becomes an efficient catalyst for fuel cells as well as various industrial chemical reactions. Thus, these modifications on surface of Pt particles electrocatalysts could also to be applied in MOR for future DMFC.
On the other hand, to reduce the consumption of the Pt catalysts, the modification of the carbon support is also another useful way. This not only improves the transport capacity of protons but also reduces the usage of Nafion, which can cut the cost of the fuel cell. Moreover, with regards to the carbon support for the ORR catalysis, the hydrophobic carbon support material is required to allow water (product) to be quickly removed from the catalyst surface sites, and oxygen (reactant) to access the active sites. In contrast, the MOR catalysis requires a certain degree of hydrophilic carbon support. It can be achieved by the modification of the carbon support materials. By combination of modified carbon support materials and development of new carbon support with Pt metal catalyst, it is possible to get an ideal electrocatalysts for direct methanol fuel cell technology. Combination of Pt metal with varied carbon supports with different specific surface areas, structures, pore sizes, electronic properties, and morphologies could be great catalyst to be studied for future DMFC.
Carbon support also influence the overall performance for DMFC. Vulcan XC-72R, which is a commercial carbon support, has a large surface area, appropriate particle size, and good electrical conductivity for good support. However, in the process of depositing metal particle on these support with loading of 40% or more, the particle size of metal increased quickly, which is a disadvantage for DMFC, because a higher metal loading is used to give a better performance. In addition, multiwalled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) and carbon nanofibers (CNFs) with relatively smaller surface area, large diameter, and high aspect ratio could be very difficult to deposit a catalyst with high loading metal (40% and more). Therefore, modification of MWCNTs and CNFs support must be done to improve its surface area, surface functional groups, and reduce the wall thickness to achieve outstanding performance for direct methanol fuel cell even though high loading metal catalyst is consumed. As well, a great and important part to be further studied in DMFC system is about the anode and cathode catalyst preparation approaches.
Abbreviations
- CB:
-
Carbon black
- CH3O:
-
methoxy group
- CNC:
-
Carbon nano cage
- CNF:
-
Carbon nano fiber
- CNT:
-
Carbon nano tube
- Co:
-
Cobalt
- Co:
-
Cobalt
- CO:
-
Monoxide molecules
- CO2 :
-
Carbon dioxide
- DMFC:
-
Direct methanol fuel cell
- FC:
-
Fuel cell
- Fe:
-
Iron
- MOR:
-
Methanol oxidation reaction
- MPC:
-
Mesoporous carbon
- MWCNT:
-
Multi wall carbon nanotube
- Ni:
-
Nickel
- OMC:
-
Ordered mesoporous carbon
- ORR:
-
Oxygen reduction reaction
- PANi:
-
Polyaniline
- PEMFC:
-
Proton exchange membrane fuel cell
- Ppy:
-
Polypyrrole
- Pt:
-
Platinum
- Pt/MWCNT:
-
Platinum-supported MWCNT
- Pt-Ru/MWCNT:
-
Platinum-ruthenium-supported MWCNT
- Rh:
-
Rhodium
- Ru:
-
Ruthenium
- Sn:
-
Sternum
- SOFC:
-
Solid oxide fuel cell
- SWCNT:
-
Single-wall carbon nanotube
- TMN:
-
Transition metal nitride
References
Sharma S, Pollet BG (2012) Support materials for PEMFC and DMFC electrocatalysts—a review. J Power Sources 208:96–119
Karim NA, Kamarudin SK, Shyuan LK, Yaakob Z, Daud WRW, Kadhum AAH (2015) Study on the electronic properties and molecule adsorption of W18O49nanowires as a catalyst support in the cathodes of direct methanol fuel cells. J Power Sources 288:461–472
Casalegno A, Bresciani F, Di Noto V, Casari CS, Li Bassi A, Negro E, Marchesi R, Di Fonzo F (2014) Nanostructured Pd barrier for low methanol crossover DMFC. Int J Hydrog Energy 39:2801–2811
Kumar P, Kundu PP (2015) Coating and lamination of Nafion117 with partially sulfonated PVdF for low methanol crossover in DMFC applications. Electrochim Acta 173:124–130
Seo SH, Lee CS (2010) A study on the overall efficiency of direct methanol fuel cell by methanol crossover current. Appl Energy 87:2597–2604
Zakil FA, Kamarudin SK, Basri S (2016) Modified Nafion membranes for direct alcohol fuel cells: an overview. Renew Sust Energ Rev 65:841–852
H.Thiam, , W.R.W. Daud, S.K. Kamarudin, A.B. Mohamad, A.A.H. Kadhum, K.S. Loh, and E. Majlan, Performance of direct methanol fuel cell with a palladium–silica nanofibre/Nafion composite membrane. Energy Convers Manag 75(2013) 718–726
Wilberforce T, Alaswad A, Palumbo A, Dassisti M, Olabi AG (2016) Advances in stationary and portable fuel cell applications. Int J Hydrog Energy 41:16509–16522
Gong L, Yang Z, Li K, Xing W, Liu C, Ge J (2018) Recent development of methanol electrooxidation catalysts for direct methanol fuel cell. J Energy Chem 27:1618–1628
Yan XH, Gao P, Zhao G, Shi L, Xu JB, Zhao TS (2017) Transport of highly concentrated fuel in direct methanol fuel cells. Appl Therm Eng 126:290–295
Coutanceau C, Koffi RK, Léger J-M, Marestin K, Mercier R, Nayoze C, Capron P (2006) Development of materials for mini DMFC working at room temperature for portable applications. J Power Sources 160:334–339
Borello D, Calabriso A, Cedola L, Del Zotto L, Santori SG (2014) Development of improved passive configurations of DMFC with reduced contact resistance. Energy Procedia 61:2654–2657
Wang L, Yuan Z, Wen F, Cheng Y, Zhang Y, Wang G (2018) A bipolar passive DMFC stack for portable applications. Energy 144:587–593
Dillon R, Srinivasan S, Aricò AS, Antonucci V (2004) International activities in DMFC R&D: status of technologies and potential applications. J Power Sources 127:112–126
Shrivastava NK, Thombre SB, Wasewar KL (2013) Nonisothermal mathematical model for performance evaluation of passive direct methanol fuel cells. J Energy Eng 139:266–274
Chen R, Zhao TS (2005) Mathematical modeling of a passive-feed DMFC with heat transfer effect. J Power Sources 152:122–130
Gwak G, Lee K, Ferekh S, Lee S, Ju H (2015) Analyzing the effects of fluctuating methanol feed concentration in active-type direct methanol fuel cell (DMFC) systems. Int J Hydrog Energy 40:5396–5407
Zhao TS, Chen R, Yang WW, Xu C (2009) Small direct methanol fuel cells with passive supply of reactants. J Power Sources 191:185–202
Paust N, Litterst C, Metz T, Zengerle R, Koltay P (2008) Fully passive degassing and fuel supply in direct methanol fuel cells. Proc IEEE Int Conf Micro Electro Mech Syst:34–37
Shimizu T, Momma T, Mohamedi M, Osaka T, Sarangapani S (2004) Design and fabrication of pumpless small direct methanol fuel cells for portable applications. J Power Sources 137:277–283
Kwon JM, Kim YJ, Cho HJ (2011) High-efficiency active DMFC system for portable applications. IEEE Trans Power Electron 26:2201–2209
Rashidi R, Dincer I, Naterer GF, Berg P (2009) Performance evaluation of direct methanol fuel cells for portable applications. J Power Sources 187:509–516
Yang QW, Hu XQ, Lei XC, Zhu Y, Wang XY, Ji SC (2018) Adaptive operation strategy for voltage stability enhancement in active DMFCs. Energy Convers Manag 168:11–20
Xu Q, Zhang W, Zhao J, Xing L, Ma Q, Xu L, Su H (2018) Effect of air supply on the performance of an active direct methanol fuel cell ( DMFC ) fed with neat methanol. Int J Green Energy 15:181–188
Paust N, Krumbholz S, Munt S, Miller C, Zengerle R, Ziegler C, Koltay P (2009) Design of a passive and portable DMFC operating in all orientations. Proc IEEE Int Conf Micro Electro Mech Syst:1091–1094
Yang L, Kimmel YC, Lu Q, Chen JG (2015) Effect of pretreatment atmosphere on the particle size and oxygen reduction activity of low-loading platinum impregnated titanium carbide powder electrocatalysts. J Power Sources 287:196–202
Du J-J, Chen C, Gan Y-L, Zhang R-H, Yang C-Y, Zhou X-W (2014) Facile one-pot hydrothermal synthesis of Pt nanoparticles and their electrocatalytic performance. Int J Hydrog Energy 39:17634–17637
Wang Z-B, Li C-Z, Gu D-M, Yin G-P (2013) Carbon riveted PtRu/C catalyst from glucose in-situ carbonization through hydrothermal method for direct methanol fuel cell. J Power Sources 238:283–289
Bresciani F, Rabissi C, Casalegno A, Zago M, Marchesi R (2014) Experimental investigation on DMFC temporary degradation. Int J Hydrog Energy 39:21647–21656
Yu X, Zhang Q, Ling Y, Yang Z, Cheng H (2018) Promoted stability and electrocatalytic activity of PtRu electrocatalyst derived from coating by cerium oxide with high oxygen storage capacity. Appl Surf Sci 455:815–820
Hacquard A (2005) Improving and understanding direct methanol fuel cell ( DMFC ) performance by
Alcaide F, Álvarez G, Cabot PL, Grande H-J, Miguel O, Querejeta A (2011) Testing of carbon supported Pd–Pt electrocatalysts for methanol electrooxidation in direct methanol fuel cells. Int J Hydrog Energy 36:4432–4439
Flórez-Montaño J, Calderón-Cárdenas A, Lizcano-Valbuena W, Rodríguez JL, Pastor E (2016) Ni@Pt nanodisks with low Pt content supported on reduced graphene oxide for methanol electrooxidation in alkaline media. Int J Hydrog Energy 41:19799–19809
Liu H, Song C, Zhang L, Zhang J, Wang H, Wilkinson DP (2006) A review of anode catalysis in the direct methanol fuel cell. J Power Sources 155:95–110
Arico AS, Monforte G, Modica E, Antonucci PL, Antonucci V (2000) Investigation of unsupported Pt–Ru catalysts for high temperature methanol electro-oxidation. Electrochem Commun 2:466–470
Zeng J, Lee JY (2005) Effects of preparation conditions on performance of carbon-supported nanosize Pt-Co catalysts for methanol electro-oxidation under acidic conditions. J Power Sources 140:268–273
Yuan W, Zhang Y, Zhang N, Yin C, Zhang X, Liu X (2017) Carbon riveted Pt-MnO2/reduced graphene oxide anode catalyst for DMFC. Catal Commun 100:66–70
Shi M, Zhang W, Zhao D, Chu Y, Ma C (2014) Reduced graphene oxide-supported tungsten carbide modified with ultralow-platinum and ruthenium-loading for methanol oxidation. Electrochim Acta 143:222–231
Paulus UA, Endruschat U, Feldmeyer GJ, Schmidt TJ, Bönnemann H, Behm RJ (2000) New PtRu alloy colloids as precursors for fuel cell catalysts. J Catal 195:383–393
Jha N, Jafri RI, Rajalakshmi N, Ramaprabhu S (2011) Graphene-multi walled carbon nanotube hybrid electrocatalyst support material for direct methanol fuel cell. Int J Hydrog Energy 36:7284–7290
Sahin O, Kivrak H (2013) A comparative study of electrochemical methods on Pt–Ru DMFC anode catalysts: the effect of Ru addition. Int J Hydrog Energy 38:901–909
Feng L, Li K, Chang J, Liu C, Xing W (2015) Nanostructured PtRu/C catalyst promoted by CoP as an efficient and robust anode catalyst in direct methanol fuel cells. Nano Energy 15:462–469
Torabi M, Karimi Shervedani R, Amini A (2018) High performance porous graphene nanoribbons electrodes synthesized via hydrogen plasma and modified by Pt-Ru nanoclusters for charge storage and methanol oxidation. Electrochim Acta 290:616–625
Park K-W, Han D-S, Sung Y-E (2006) PtRh alloy nanoparticle electrocatalysts for oxygen reduction for use in direct methanol fuel cells. J Power Sources 163:82–86
Tokarz W, Siwek H, Piela P, Czerwiński A (2007) Electro-oxidation of methanol on Pt-Rh alloys. Electrochim Acta 52:5565–5573
Wang J, Shi R, Guo X, Xi J, Zhao J, Song C, Wang L, Zhang J (2014) Highly active Pt-on-Au catalysts for methanol oxidation in alkaline media involving a synergistic interaction between Pt and au. Electrochim Acta 123:309–316
Chang G, Cai Z, Jia H, Zhang Z, Liu X, Liu Z, Zhu R, He Y (2018) High electrocatalytic performance of a graphene-supported PtAu nanoalloy for methanol oxidation. Int J Hydrog Energy 43:12803–12810
Urbańczyk E, Jaroń A, Simka W (2018) NiPt sinter as a promising electrode for methanol electrocatalytic oxidation. Int J Hydrog Energy 43:17156–17163
Zhou X-W, Zhang R-H, Zhou Z-Y, Sun S-G (2011) Preparation of PtNi hollow nanospheres for the electrocatalytic oxidation of methanol. J Power Sources 196:5844–5848
Xu C, Hou J, Pang X, Li X, Zhu M, Tang B (2012) Nanoporous PtCo and PtNi alloy ribbons for methanol electrooxidation. Int J Hydrog Energy 37:10489–10498
Baronia R, Goel J, Tiwari S, Singh P, Singh D, Singh SP, Singhal SK (2017) Efficient electro-oxidation of methanol using PtCo nanocatalysts supported reduced graphene oxide matrix as anode for DMFC. Int J Hydrog Energy 42:10238–10247
Yao J, Yao Y (2015) Experimental study of characteristics of bimetallic Pt–Fe nano-particle fuel cell electrocatalyst. Renew Energy 81:182–196
Han DM, Guo ZP, Zeng R, Kim CJ, Meng YZ, Liu HK (2009) Multiwalled carbon nanotube-supported Pt/Sn and Pt/Sn/PMo12 electrocatalysts for methanol electro-oxidation. Int J Hydrog Energy 34:2426–2434
Ma X, Luo L, Zhu L, Yu L, Sheng L, An K, Ando Y, Zhao X (2013) Pt–Fe catalyst nanoparticles supported on single-wall carbon nanotubes: direct synthesis and electrochemical performance for methanol oxidation. J Power Sources 241:274–280
Guerrero-Ortega LPA, Manzo-Robledo A, Ramírez-Meneses E, Mateos-Santiago J, Lartundo-Rojas L, Garibay-Febles V (2018) Methanol electro-oxidation reaction at the interface of (bi)-metallic (PtNi) synthesized nanoparticles supported on carbon Vulcan. Int J Hydrog Energy 43:6117–6130
Han F, Wang X, Lian J, Wang Y (2012) The effect of Sn content on the electrocatalytic properties of Pt–Sn nanoparticles dispersed on graphene nanosheets for the methanol oxidation reaction. Carbon N Y 50:5498–5504
Sharma S, Ganguly A, Papakonstantinou P, Miao X, Li M, Hutchison JL, Delichatsios M, Ukleja S (2010) Rapid microwave synthesis of CO tolerant reduced graphene oxide-supported platinum Electrocatalysts for oxidation of methanol. J Phys Chem C 114:19459–19466
Aricò AS, Antonucci V, Giordano N, Shukla AK, Ravikumar MK, Roy A, Barman SR, Sarma DD (1994) Methanol oxidation on carbon-supported platinum-tin electrodes in sulfuric acid. J Power Sources 50:295–309
Goodenough JB, Hamnett A, Kennedy BJ, Manoharan R, Weeks SA (1988) Methanol oxidation on unsupported and carbon supported Pt + Ru anodes. J Electroanal Chem Interfacial Electrochem 240:133–145 https://doi.org/10.1016/0022-0728(88)80318-8
Yajima T, Uchida H, Watanabe M (2004) In-situ ATR-FTIR spectroscopic study of electro-oxidation of methanol and adsorbed CO at Pt−Ru alloy. J Phys Chem B 108:2654–2659
Marković NM, Gasteiger HA, Ross PN, Jiang X, Villegas I, Weaver MJ (1995) Electro-oxidation mechanisms of methanol and formic acid on Pt-Ru alloy surfaces. Electrochim Acta 40:91–98
Zignani SC, Baglio V, Sebastián D, Rocha TA, Gonzalez ER, Aricò AS (2016) Investigation of PtNi/C as methanol tolerant electrocatalyst for the oxygen reduction reaction. J Electroanal Chem 763:10–17
Hsieh C-T, Chen W-Y, Chen I-L, Roy AK (2012) Deposition and activity stability of Pt–co catalysts on carbon nanotube-based electrodes prepared by microwave-assisted synthesis. J Power Sources 199:94–102
Zhang J-M, Sun S-N, Li Y, Zhang X-J, Zhang P-Y, Fan Y-J (2017) A strategy in deep eutectic solvents for carbon nanotube-supported PtCo nanocatalysts with enhanced performance toward methanol electrooxidation. Int J Hydrog Energy 42:26744–26751
Baglio V, Aricò AS, Stassi A, D’Urso A, Di Blasi AMC, Luna VA (2006) Investigation of Pt–Fe catalysts for oxygen reduction in low temperature direct methanol fuel cells. J Power Sources 159:900–904
Eshghi A, Kheirmand M, Sabzehmeidani MM (2018) Platinum–Iron nanoparticles supported on reduced graphene oxide as an improved catalyst for methanol electro oxidation. Int J Hydrog Energy 43:6107–6116
Hsieh C-T, Hung W-M, Chen W-Y, Lin J-Y (2011) Microwave-assisted polyol synthesis of Pt–Zn electrocatalysts on carbon nanotube electrodes for methanol oxidation. Int J Hydrog Energy 36:2765–2772
Yang LX, Allen RG, Scott K, Christenson P, Roy S (2004) A comparative study of PtRu and PtRuSn thermally formed on titanium mesh for methanol electro-oxidation. J Power Sources 137:257–263
Kang DK, Noh CS, Kim NH, Cho SH, Sohn JM, Kim TJ, Park YK (2010) Effect of transition metals (Ni, Sn and Mo) in Pt5Ru4M alloy ternary electrocatalyst on methanol electro-oxidation. J Ind Eng Chem 16:385–389
Kakati N, Maiti J, Oh JY, Yoon YS (2011) Study of methanol oxidation of hydrothermally synthesized PtRuMo on multi wall carbon nanotubes. Appl Surf Sci 257:8433–8437
Jeon MK, McGinn PJ (2009) Improvement of methanol electro-oxidation activity of PtRu/C and PtNiCr/C catalysts by anodic treatment. J Power Sources 188:427–432
Jia H, Chang G, Shu H, Xu M, Wang X, Zhang Z, Liu X, He H, Wang K, Zhu R, He Y (2017) Pt nanoparticles modified Au dendritic nanostructures: facile synthesis and enhanced electrocatalytic performance for methanol oxidation. Int J Hydrog Energy 42:22100–22107
Lim D-H, Choi D-H, Lee W-D, Lee H-I (2009) A new synthesis of a highly dispersed and CO tolerant PtSn/C electrocatalyst for low-temperature fuel cell; its electrocatalytic activity and long-term durability. Appl Catal B Environ 89:484–493
Amani M, Kazemeini M, Hamedanian M, Pahlavanzadeh H, Gharibi H (2015) Investigation of methanol oxidation on a highly active and stable Pt–Sn electrocatalyst supported on carbon–polyaniline composite for application in a passive direct methanol fuel cell. Mater Res Bull 68:166–178
Hsieh C-T, Liu Y-Y, Chen W-Y, Hsieh Y-H (2011) Electrochemical activity and durability of Pt–Sn alloys on carbon-based electrodes prepared by microwave-assisted synthesis. Int J Hydrog Energy 36:15766–15774
Wang Y, Zou L, Huang Q, Zou Z, Yang H (2017) 3D carbon aerogel-supported PtNi intermetallic nanoparticles with high metal loading as a durable oxygen reduction electrocatalyst. Int J Hydrog Energy 42:26695–26703
Nassr ABAA, Sinev I, Grünert W, Bron M (2013) PtNi supported on oxygen functionalized carbon nanotubes: in depth structural characterization and activity for methanol electrooxidation. Appl Catal B Environ 142–143:849–860
Jeon MK, McGinn PJ (2009) Composition dependence of ternary Pt–Ni–Cr catalyst activity for the methanol electro-oxidation reaction. J Power Sources 194:737–745
Alyousef YM, Datta MK, Yao SC, Kumta PN (2009) Complexed sol–gel synthesis of improved Pt–Ru–Os-based anode electro-catalysts for direct methanol fuel cells. J Phys Chem Solids 70:1019–1023
Alyousef YM, Datta MK, Kadakia K, Yao SC, Kumta PN (2010) Sol–gel synthesis of Pt-Ru-Os-Ir based anode electro-catalysts for direct methanol fuel cells. J Alloys Compd 506:698–702
Neburchilov V, Wang H, Zhang J (2007) Low Pt content Pt–Ru–Ir–Sn quaternary catalysts for anodic methanol oxidation in DMFC. Electrochem Commun 9:1788–1792
Lin L, Zhou W, Gao R, Yao S, Zhang X, Xu W, Zheng S, Jiang Z, Yu Q, Li Y-W, Shi C, Wen X-D, Ma D (2017) Low-temperature hydrogen production from water and methanol using Pt/α-MoC catalysts. Nature 544:80
Thepkaew J, Therdthianwong S, Therdthianwong A, Kucernak A, Wongyao N (2013) Promotional roles of Ru and Sn in mesoporous PtRu and PtRuSn catalysts toward ethanol electrooxidation. Int J Hydrog Energy 38:9454–9463
Ribeiro VA, Correa OV, Neto AO, Linardi M, Spinacé EV (2010) Preparation of PtRuNi/C electrocatalysts by an alcohol-reduction process for electro-oxidation of methanol. Appl Catal A Gen 372:162–166
Wang W, Wang R, Wang H, Ji S, Key J, Li X, Lei Z (2011) An advantageous method for methanol oxidation: design and fabrication of a nanoporous PtRuNi trimetallic electrocatalyst. J Power Sources 196:9346–9351
Löffler M-S, Natter H, Hempelmann R, Wippermann K (2003) Preparation and characterisation of Pt–Ru model electrodes for the direct methanol fuel cell. Electrochim Acta 48:3047–3051
Dinh HN, Ren X, Garzon FH, Piotr Zelenay SG (2000) Electrocatalysis in direct methanol fuel cells: in-situ probing of PtRu anode catalyst surfaces. J Electroanal Chem 491:222–233
ZHONG S, HU X, YU Y, YU C, ZHOU Y (2018) Core-shell hierarchical tungsten carbide composite microspheres towards methanol electrooxidation. J Fuel Chem Technol 46:585–591
Lausche AC, Schaidle JA, Schweitzer N, Thompson LT (2013) In: Reedijk J, K.B.T.-C.I.C.I.I. (Second E. Poeppelmeier (eds) 7.14 - Nanoscale carbide and nitride catalysts. Elsevier, Amsterdam, pp 371–404
Shi M, Zhang W, Li Y, Chu Y, Ma C (2016) Tungsten carbide-reduced graphene oxide intercalation compound as co-catalyst for methanol oxidation. Chinese J Catal 37:1851–1859
Negro E, Di Noto V (2008) Polymer electrolyte fuel cells based on bimetallic carbon nitride electrocatalysts. J Power Sources 178:634–641
Pan C, Li Y, Ma Y, Zhao X, Zhang Q (2011) Platinum–antimony doped tin oxide nanoparticles supported on carbon black as anode catalysts for direct methanol fuel cells. J Power Sources 196:6228–6231
Abida B, Chirchi L, Baranton S, Napporn TW, Kochkar H, Léger J-M, Ghorbel A (2011) Preparation and characterization of Pt/TiO2 nanotubes catalyst for methanol electro-oxidation. Appl. Catal. B Environ 106:609–615
Wu X, Zhuang W, Lu L, Li L, Zhu J, Mu L, Li W, Zhu Y, Lu X (2017) Excellent performance of Pt-C/TiO2 for methanol oxidation: contribution of mesopores and partially coated carbon. Appl Surf Sci 426:890–896
Zhou Y, Hu X, Xiao Y, Shu Q (2013) Platinum nanoparticles supported on hollow mesoporous tungsten trioxide microsphere as electrocatalyst for methanol oxidation. Electrochim Acta 111:588–592
Huang T, Zhang D, Xue L, Cai W-B, Yu A (2009) A facile method to synthesize well-dispersed PtRuMoOx and PtRuWOx nanoparticles and their electrocatalytic activities for methanol oxidation. J Power Sources 192:285–290
Salazar-Banda GR, Eguiluz KIB, Pupo MMS, Suffredini HB, Calegaro ML, Avaca LA (2012) The influence of different co-catalysts in Pt-based ternary and quaternary electro-catalysts on the electro-oxidation of methanol and ethanol in acid media. J Electroanal Chem 668:13–25
Huang T, Jiang R, Liu J, Zhuang J, Cai W-B, Yu A (2009) Synthesis of well-dispersed PtRuSnOx by ultrasonic-assisted chemical reduction and its property for methanol electrooxidation. Electrochim Acta 54:4436–4440
Tsiouvaras N, Martínez-Huerta MV, Paschos O, Stimming U, Fierro JLG, Peña MA (2010) PtRuMo/C catalysts for direct methanol fuel cells: effect of the pretreatment on the structural characteristics and methanol electrooxidation. Int J Hydrog Energy 35:11478–11488
Hu Y, Shao Q, Wu P, Zhang H, Cai C (2012) Electrochemistry communications synthesis of hollow mesoporous Pt – Ni nanosphere for highly active electrocatalysis toward the methanol oxidation reaction. Electrochem Commun 18:96–99
Yang Y, Cheng P, Huang S (2016) Unraveling the roles of iron in stabilizing the defective graphene-supported PtFe bimetallic nanoparticles. J Alloys Compd 688:1172–1180
Liu Y, Mustain WE (2012) Evaluation of tungsten carbide as the electrocatalyst support for platinum hydrogen evolution / oxidation catalysts. Int J Hydrog Energy 37:8929–8938
Wang Y, Song S, Maragou V, Shen PK, Tsiakaras P (2009) High surface area tungsten carbide microspheres as effective Pt catalyst support for oxygen reduction reaction. Appl Catal B Environ 89:223–228
Wu Y, Dang J, Lv Z, Zhang R (2018) The preparation of tungsten carbides and tungsten powders by reaction of tungsten trioxide with methanol. Int J Refract Met Hard Mater 76:99–107
Liang Y, Chen L, Ma C (2017) Kinetics and thermodynamics of H2O dissociation and CO oxidation on the Pt/WC (0001) surface: a density functional theory study. Surf Sci 656:7–16
Christian JB, Smith SPE, Whittingham MS, Abruña HD (2007) Tungsten based electrocatalyst for fuel cell applications. Electrochem Commun 9:2128–2132
Liu N, Kourtakis K, Figueroa JC, Chen JG (2003) Potential application of tungsten carbides as electrocatalysts: III. Reactions of methanol, water, and hydrogen on Pt-modified C/W(111) surfaces. J Catal 215:254–263
Ma C, Liu W, Shi M, Lang X, Chu Y, Chen Z, Zhao D, Lin W, Hardacre C (2013) Low loading platinum nanoparticles on reduced graphene oxide-supported tungsten carbide crystallites as a highly active electrocatalyst for methanol oxidation. Electrochim Acta 114:133–141
Hassan A, Paganin VA, Ticianelli EA (2015) Pt modified tungsten carbide as anode electrocatalyst for hydrogen oxidation in proton exchange membrane fuel cell: CO tolerance and stability. Appl Catal B Environ 165:611–619
Zellner MB, Chen JG (2005) Surface science and electrochemical studies of WC and W2C PVD films as potential electrocatalysts. Catal Today 99:299–307
Di Noto V, Negro E, Lavina S, Gross S, Pace G (2007) Pd-Co carbon-nitride electrocatalysts for polymer electrolyte fuel cells. Electrochim Acta 53:1604–1617
Xiao Y, Zhan G, Fu Z, Pan Z, Xiao C, Wu S, Chen C, Hu G, Wei Z (2015) Titanium cobalt nitride supported platinum catalyst with high activity and stability for oxygen reduction reaction. J Power Sources 284:296–304
Thotiyl MMO, Ravikumar T, Sampath S (2010) Platinum particles supported on titanium nitride : an efficient electrode material for the oxidation of methanol in alkaline media. J Mater Chem 20:10643–10651
Ahmad MM, Kamarudin SK, Daud WRW, Yaakub Z (2010) High power passive μDMFC with low catalyst loading for small power generation. Energy Convers Manag 51:821–825
Patel PP, Datta MK, Jampani PH, Hong D, Poston JA, Manivannan A, Kumta PN (2015) High performance and durable nanostructured TiN supported Pt50–Ru50 anode catalyst for direct methanol fuel cell (DMFC). J Power Sources 293:437–446
Li W, Pan Z, Huang Z, Zhou Q, Xu Y, Wu S, Chen C, Lin Y, Hu G (2018) Pt nanoparticles supported on titanium iron nitride nanotubes prepared as a superior electrocatalysts for methanol electrooxidation. Int J Hydrog Energy 43:9777–9786 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijhydene.2018.04.028
Xiao Y, Fu Z, Zhan G, Pan Z, Xiao C, Wu S, Chen C, Hu G, Wei Z (2015) Increasing Pt methanol oxidation reaction activity and durability with a titanium molybdenum nitride catalyst support. J Power Sources 273:33–40
Liu G, Pan Z, Li W, Yu K, Xia G, Zhao Q, Shi S, Hu G, Xiao C, Wei Z (2017) The effect of titanium nickel nitride decorated carbon nanotubes-reduced graphene oxide hybrid support for methanol oxidation. Appl Surf Sci 410:70–78
Xiao Y, Zhan G, Fu Z, Pan Z, Xiao C, Wu S, Chen C, Hu G, Wei Z (2014) Robust non-carbon titanium nitride nanotubes supported Pt catalyst with enhanced catalytic activity and durability for methanol oxidation reaction. Electrochim Acta 141:279–285
Wu W, Xiang XD, Lin YL, Li WS (2013) Platinum nanoparticles supported on pore-arrayed tungsten trioxide as electrocatalyst for methanol oxidation. Int J Hydrog Energy 38:11080–11084
Li Y, Liu C, Liu Y, Feng B, Li L, Pan H, Kellogg W, Higgins D, Wu G (2015) Sn-doped TiO2 modified carbon to support Pt anode catalysts for direct methanol fuel cells. J Power Sources 286:354–361
Lv Q, Yin M, Zhao X, Li C, Liu C, Xing W (2012) Promotion effect of TiO2 on catalytic activity and stability of Pt catalyst for electrooxidation of methanol. J Power Sources 218:93–99
Huang J, Zang J, Zhao Y, Dong L, Wang Y (2014) One-step synthesis of nanocrystalline TiO2-coated carbon nanotube support for Pt electrocatalyst in direct methanol fuel cell. Mater Lett 137:335–338
Hao Y, Wang X, Zheng Y, Shen J, Yuan J, Wang A, Niu L, Huang S (2016) Uniform Pt nanoparticles incorporated into reduced graphene oxides with MoO3 as advanced anode catalysts for methanol electro-oxidation. Electrochim Acta 198:127–134
Abdel Hameed RM, Fetohi AE, Amin RS, El-Khatib KM (2015) Promotion effect of manganese oxide on the electrocatalytic activity of Pt/C for methanol oxidation in acid medium. Appl Surf Sci 359:651–663
Zhao Y, Fan L, Ren J, Hong B (2014) Electrodeposition of Pt–Ru and Pt–Ru–Ni nanoclusters on multi-walled carbon nanotubes for direct methanol fuel cell. Int J Hydrog Energy 39:4544–4557
Sieben JM, Ansón-Casaos A, Martínez MT, Morallón E (2013) Single-walled carbon nanotube buckypapers as electrocatalyst supports for methanol oxidation. J Power Sources 242:7–14
Kakati N, Maiti J, Jee SH, Lee SH, Yoon YS (2011) Hydrothermal synthesis of PtRu on CNT / SnO 2 composite as anode catalyst for methanol oxidation fuel cell. J Alloys Compd 509:5617–5622
Mirabile Gattia D, Antisari MV, Giorgi L, Marazzi R, Piscopiello E, Montone A, Bellitto S, Licoccia S, Traversa E (2009) Study of different nanostructured carbon supports for fuel cell catalysts. J Power Sources 194:243–251
Hanaei H, Assadi MK, Saidur R (2016) Highly efficient antireflective and self-cleaning coatings that incorporate carbon nanotubes (CNTs) into solar cells: a review. Renew Sust Energ Rev 59:620–635
Mu X, Xu Z, Xie Y, Mi H, Ma J (2017) Pt nanoparticles supported on co embedded coal-based carbon nano fi ber for enhanced electrocatalytic activity towards methanol. J Alloys Compd 711:374–380
Cheng Z-L, Li W, Wu P-R, Liu Z (2017) A strategy for preparing modified graphene oxide with good dispersibility and transparency in oil. Ind Eng Chem Res 56:5527–5534
Alba A (1999) Enfermedad De Vogt-Koyanagi-Harada. Seminarios de la Fundación Española de Reumatología 1906:666–670
Dong L, Reddy R, Gari S, Li Z, Craig MM, Hou S (2009) Graphene-supported platinum and platinum–ruthenium nanoparticles with high electrocatalytic activity for methanol and ethanol oxidation. Carbon N. Y. 48:781–787
Qiu J-D, Wang G-C, Liang R-P, Xia X-H, Yu H-W (2011) Controllable deposition of platinum nanoparticles on graphene as an electrocatalyst for direct methanol fuel cells. J Phys Chem C 115:15639–15645
Marinho B, Ghislandi M, Tkalya E, Koning CE (2012) G. de with, electrical conductivity of compacts of graphene, multi-wall carbon nanotubes, carbon black, and graphite powder. Powder Technol 221:351–358
Zhang M, Xie J, Sun Q, Yan Z, Chen M, Jing J (2013) Enhanced electrocatalytic activity of high Pt-loadings on surface functionalized graphene nanosheets for methanol oxidation. Int J Hydrog Energy 38:16402–16409
Huang H, Sun D, Wang X (2012) PtCo alloy nanoparticles supported on graphene nanosheets with high performance for methanol oxidation. Chin Sci Bull 57:3071–3079
Zhao L, Wang Z, Li J, Zhang J, Sui X, Zhang L (2016) Electrochimica Acta hybrid of carbon-supported Pt nanoparticles and three dimensional graphene aerogel as high stable electrocatalyst for methanol electrooxidation. Electrochim Acta 189:175–183
Jha N, Mohana AL, Shaijumon MM, Rajalakshmi N, Ramaprabhu S (2008) Pt – Ru / multi-walled carbon nanotubes as electrocatalysts for direct methanol fuel cell. Int J Hydrogen 33:427–433
Wang Z-C, Ma Z-M, Li H-L (2008) Functional multi-walled carbon nanotube/polysiloxane composite films as supports of PtNi alloy nanoparticles for methanol electro-oxidation. Appl Surf Sci 254:6521–6526
Xu M-W, Su Z, Weng Z-W, Wang Z-C, Dong B (2010) An approach for synthesizing PtRu/MWCNT nanocomposite for methanol electro-oxidation. Mater Chem Phys 124:785–790
Kong YC, Wu PR, Dong JW, Ding HL, Liu Z, Cheng ZL (2018) Oxalic acid assisted expansion–reduction exfoliation of graphene oxide into graphene nanosheets. Mater Lett 231:51–55
Zhao L, Wang Z-B, Li J-L, Zhang J-J, Sui X-L, Zhang L-M (2016) Hybrid of carbon-supported Pt nanoparticles and three dimensional graphene aerogel as high stable electrocatalyst for methanol electrooxidation. Electrochim Acta 189:175–183
Ma J, Wang L, Mu X, Cao Y (2015) Enhanced electrocatalytic activity of Pt nanoparticles supported on functionalized graphene for methanol oxidation and oxygen reduction. J Colloid Interface Sci 457:102–107
Zhang X, Yuan W, Duan J, Zhang Y, Liu X (2015) Graphene nanosheets modified by nitrogen-doped carbon layer to support Pt nanoparticles for direct methanol fuel cell. Microelectron Eng 141:234–237
Ojani R, Raoof J-B, Goli M, Valiollahi R (2014) Pt–Co nanostructures electrodeposited on graphene nanosheets for methanol electrooxidation. J Power Sources 264:76–82
Zhang M, Li Y, Yan Z, Jing J, Xie J, Chen M (2015) Improved catalytic activity of cobalt core–platinum shell nanoparticles supported on surface functionalized graphene for methanol electro-oxidation. Electrochim Acta 158:81–88
Félix-Navarro RM, Beltrán-Gastélum M, Reynoso-Soto EA, Paraguay-Delgado F, Alonso-Nuñez G, Flores-Hernández JR (2016) Bimetallic Pt–Au nanoparticles supported on multi-wall carbon nanotubes as electrocatalysts for oxygen reduction. Renew Energy 87:31–41
Jeng K-T, Chien C-C, Hsu N-Y, Yen S-C, Chiou S-D, Lin S-H, Huang W-M (2006) Performance of direct methanol fuel cell using carbon nanotube-supported Pt–Ru anode catalyst with controlled composition. J Power Sources 160:97–104
Yan Z, He G, Jiang Z, Wei W, Gao L, Xie J (2015) Mesoporous graphene-like nanobowls as Pt electrocatalyst support for highly active and stable methanol oxidation. J Power Sources 284:497–503
Wang D, Liu Y, Huang J, You T (2012) In situ synthesis of Pt/carbon nanofiber nanocomposites with enhanced electrocatalytic activity toward methanol oxidation. J Colloid Interface Sci 367:199–203
Giorgi L, Salernitano E, Dikonimos Makris T, Gagliardi S, Contini V, De Francesco M (2014) Innovative electrodes for direct methanol fuel cells based on carbon nanofibers and bimetallic PtAu nanocatalysts. Int J Hydrog Energy 39:21601–21612
Watanabe M, Motoo S (1975) Electrocatalysis by ad-atoms: part II. Enhancement of the oxidation of methanol on platinum by ruthenium ad-atoms. J Electroanal Chem Interfacial Electrochem 60:267–273
Calderón JC, García G, Calvillo L, Rodríguez JL, Lázaro MJ, Pastor E (2015) Electrochemical oxidation of CO and methanol on Pt–Ru catalysts supported on carbon nanofibers: the influence of synthesis method. Appl Catal B Environ 165:676–686
Wu G, Xu B-Q (2007) Carbon nanotube supported Pt electrodes for methanol oxidation: a comparison between multi- and single-walled carbon nanotubes. J Power Sources 174:148–158
WANG X, ZHANG J, ZHU H (2011) Pt-Au/CNT@TiO2 as a high-performance anode catalyst for direct methanol fuel cells. Chin J Catal 32:74–79 https://doi.org/10.1016/S1872-2067(10)60163-5
Zhao Z, Fang X, Li Y, Wang Y, Shen PK, Xie F, Zhang X (2009) The origin of the high performance of tungsten carbides/carbon nanotubes supported Pt catalysts for methanol electrooxidation. Electrochem Commun 11:290–293
Yoshitake T, Shimakawa Y, Kuroshima S, Kimura H, Ichihashi T, Kubo Y, Kasuya D, Takahashi K, Kokai F, Yudasaka M, Iijima S (2002) Preparation of fine platinum catalyst supported on single-wall carbon nanohorns for fuel cell application. Phys B Condens Matter 323:124–126
Bruno MM, Viva FA, Petruccelli MA, Corti HR (2015) Platinum supported on mesoporous carbon as cathode catalyst for direct methanol fuel cells. J Power Sources 278:458–463
Wang K, Wang Y, Liang Z, Liang Y, Wu D, Song S, Tsiakaras P (2014) Ordered mesoporous tungsten carbide/carbon composites promoted Pt catalyst with high activity and stability for methanol electrooxidation. Appl Catal B Environ 147:518–525
Show Y, Hirai A, Almowarai A, Ueno Y (2015) Platinum catalyst formed on carbon nanotube by the in-liquid plasma method for fuel cell. Thin Solid Films 596:198–200
Matsuda N, Nakashima T, Kato T, Shiroishi H (2014) Synthesis of multiwall carbon nanotube-supported platinum catalysts by solution plasma processing for oxygen reduction in polymer electrolyte fuel cells. Electrochim Acta 146:73–78
Steigerwalt ES, Deluga GA, Cliffel DE, Lukehart CM (2001) A Pt - Ru / graphitic carbon nanofiber nanocomposite exhibiting high relative performance as a direct-methanol fuel cell anode catalyst. J Phy Chem 105:8097–8101
Maiyalagan T (2009) Silicotungstic acid stabilized Pt–Ru nanoparticles supported on carbon nanofibers electrodes for methanol oxidation. Int J Hydrog Energy 34:2874–2879
Garc E, Pastor E, Quintana JJ (2007) Platinum supported on functionalized ordered mesoporous carbon as electrocatalyst for direct methanol fuel cells. J Power Sources 169:59–64
Kuppan B, Selvam P (2013) Progress in natural Science : materials international platinum-supported mesoporous carbon ( Pt / CMK-3) as anodic catalyst for direct methanol fuel cell applications : the effect of preparation and deposition methods. Prog Nat Sci Mater Int 22:616–623
Hori Y, Wakabayashi Y, Oheda M, Mizui K, Fukumura M, Hirai Y, Nemoto Y, Toriizuka K, Ida Y (2005) Sulfonated compounds in Shokyo and Kankyo. Nat Med 59:229–236
Zheng F-S, Liu S-H, Kuo C-W (2016) Ultralow Pt amount of Pt–Fe alloys supported on ordered mesoporous carbons with excellent methanol tolerance during oxygen reduction reaction. Int J Hydrog Energy 41:2487–2497
Zhang C-W, Xu L-B, Chen J-F (2016) High loading Pt nanoparticles on ordered mesoporous carbon sphere arrays for highly active methanol electro-oxidation. Chinese Chem Lett 27:832–836
Choi J-H, Kim Y-M, Lee J-S, Cho K-Y, Jung H-Y, Park J-K, Park I-S, Sung Y-E (2005) A polyaniline supported PtRu nanocomposite anode and a Pd-impregnated nanocomposite Nafion membrane for DMFCs. Solid State Ionics 176:3031–3034
Kim S, Park S-J (2008) Electroactivity of Pt–Ru/polyaniline composite catalyst-electrodes prepared by electrochemical deposition methods. Solid State Ionics 178:1915–1921
Yaldagard M, Jahanshahi M, Seghatoleslami N (2014) Pt catalysts on PANI coated WC/C nanocomposites for methanol electro-oxidation and oxygen electro-reduction in DMFC. Appl Surf Sci 317:496–504
Wu H, Yuan T, Huang Q, Zhang H, Zou Z, Zheng J, Yang H (2014) Polypyrrole nanowire networks as anodic micro-porous layer for passive direct methanol fuel cells. Electrochim Acta 141:1–5
Selvaraj V, Alagar M (2007) Pt and Pt–Ru nanoparticles decorated polypyrrole/multiwalled carbon nanotubes and their catalytic activity towards methanol oxidation. Electrochem Commun 9:1145–1153
Abdullah N, Kamarudin SK (2015) Titanium dioxide in fuel cell technology: an overview. J Power Sources 278:108–119
Wang JJ, Yin GP, Zhang J, Wang ZB, Gao YZ (2007) High utilization platinum deposition on single-walled carbon nanotubes as catalysts for direct methanol fuel cell. Electrochim Acta 52:7042–7050
Hwu HH, Chen JG, Kourtakis K, Lavin JG (2001) Potential application of tungsten carbides as Electrocatalysts. 1. Decomposition of methanol over carbide-modified W(111). J Phys Chem B 105:10037–10044. https://doi.org/10.1021/jp0116196
Hamnett A (1997) Mechanism and electrocatalysis in the direct methanol fuel cell. Catal Today 38:445–457
Ferrin P, Udaykumar A, Greeley J, Mavrikakis M, Rossmeisl J (2008) Surface science reactivity descriptors for direct methanol fuel cell anode catalysts. Surf Sci 602:3424–3431
Wang G, Sun G, Wang Q, Wang S, Sun H, Xin Q (2010) Effect of carbon black additive in Pt black cathode catalyst layer on direct methanol fuel cell performance. Int J Hydrog Energy 35:11245–11253
Celorrio V, Calvillo L, Moliner R, Pastor E, Lázaro MJ (2013) Carbon nanocoils as catalysts support for methanol electrooxidation: a differential electrochemical mass spectrometry (DEMS) study. J Power Sources 239:72–80
Sevilla M, Lota G, Fuertes AB (2007) Saccharide-based graphitic carbon nanocoils as supports for PtRu nanoparticles for methanol electrooxidation. J Power Sources 171:546–551
Sevilla M, Sanchís C, Valdés-Solís T, Morallón E, Fuertes AB (2009) Highly dispersed platinum nanoparticles on carbon nanocoils and their electrocatalytic performance for fuel cell reactions. Electrochim Acta 54:2234–2238
Celorrio V, Flórez-Montaño J, Moliner R, Pastor E, Lázaro MJ (2014) Fuel cell performance of Pt electrocatalysts supported on carbon nanocoils. Int J Hydrog Energy 39:5371–5377
Choi J-H, Park K-W, Lee H-K, Kim Y-M, Lee J-S, Sung Y-E (2003) Nano-composite of PtRu alloy electrocatalyst and electronically conducting polymer for use as the anode in a direct methanol fuel cell. Electrochim Acta 48:2781–2789
P.L. Antonucci, A.S. Aric??, P. Cret??, E. Ramunni, V. Antonucci, Investigation of a direct methanol fuel cell based on a composite Nafion-silica electrolyte for high temperature operation, Solid State Ionics 125 (1999) 431–437
Liu J, Jiao M, Lu L, Barkholtz HM, Li Y, Wang Y, Jiang L, Wu Z, Liu D, Zhuang L, Ma C, Zeng J, Zhang B, Su D, Song P (2017) Electrocatalyst for oxygen reduction reaction. Nat Commun 8:1–9
Li J, Yin H, Li X, Okunishi E, Shen Y, He J, Tang Z (2017) Surface evolution of a Pt–Pd–Au electrocatalyst for stable oxygen reduction. Nat Energy 17111:1–9
Li M, Li M, Zhao Z, Cheng T, Fortunelli A, Chen C, Yu R, Gu L, Merinov B, Lin Z, Zhu E, Yu T, Jia Q, Guo J, Zhang L, Iii WAG, Huang Y, Duan X (2016) Ultrafine jagged platinum nanowires enable ultrahigh mass activity for the oxygen reduction reaction, 9050. Science 354:1414–1419
Bu L, Zhang N, Guo S, Zhang X, Li J, Yao J, Wu T, Lu G, Su D, Huang X (2016) Biaxially strained PtPb/Pt core/shell nanoplate boosts oxygen reduction catalysis. Science 354:1410–1414
Lu Q, Huang J, Han C, Sun L, Yang X (2018) Facile synthesis of composition-tunable PtRh nanosponges for methanol oxidation reaction. Electrochim Acta 266:305–311
Dong L, Liu Q, Wang L, Chen K (2010) Graphene-supported platinum and platinum-ruthenium nanoparticles for fuel cell applications
Li W, Liang C, Zhou W, Qiu J, Zhou Z (2003) Preparation and characterization of multiwalled carbon nanotube-supported platinum for cathode catalysts of direct methanol fuel cell. J Phys Chem 107:6292–6299
Rodriguez JR, Félix RM, Reynoso EA, Gochi-Ponce Y, Gómez YV, Moyado SF, Alonso-Núñez G (2014) Synthesis of Pt and Pt-Fe nanoparticles supported on MWCNTs used as electrocatalysts in the methanol oxidation reaction. J Energy Chem 23:483–490
Kunitomo H, Ishitobi H, Nakagawa N (2015) Optimized CeO 2 content of the carbon nano fi ber support of PtRu catalyst for direct methanol fuel cells. J Power Sources 297:400–407
Cui X, Shi J, Zhang L, Ruan M, Gao J (2008) PtCo supported on ordered mesoporous carbon as an electrode catalyst for methanol oxidation. Carbon 7:2–10
Santiago D, Rodríguez-Calero GG, Rivera H, Tryk DA, Scibioh MA, Cabrera CR (2010) Platinum electrodeposition at high surface area carbon Vulcan-XC-72R material using a rotating disk-slurry electrode technique. J Electrochem Soc 157:F189
Tang S, Sun G, Qi J, Sun S, Guo J, Xin Q, Haarberg GM (2010) Review of new carbon materials as catalyst supports in direct alcohol fuel cells, Chinese. J Catal 31:12–17
Sakanishi K, Hasuo H, Mochida I, Okumat O (1995) Preparation of highly dispersed, pp 995–998
Uchida M (1995) Influences of both carbon supports and heat-treatment of supported catalyst on electrochemical oxidation of methanol. J Electrochem Soc 142:2572
Mochida I, Fortin F (1994) Effects of carbon black addition on the pdf, vol 32, pp 801–807
Acknowledgements
The authors gratefully acknowledge the financial support given for this work by Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia under DPP-2018-003.
Funding
Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia: DPP-2018-003.
Availability of Data and Materials
The data will not be shared due to private and confidential for the purpose of patent filling.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Contributions
This paper examines recent findings in technologies related to the improved stability and better electrocatalytic performance of Pt, which were achieved via the combination of Pt catalyst with alloys (such as Fe, Ni, Co, Rh, Ru, Co, and Sn metals), and the great potential of carbon support materials with their excellent and unique characteristics (such as MWCNT, CNF, CNT, CNC, CMS, CNT, CB, and graphene). Both authors read and approved the final manuscript.
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Competing Interests
We confirm that the work described has not been published before; it is not under consideration for publication anywhere else; and publication has been approved by all co-authors and the responsible authorities at the institute(s) where the work has been carried out. We confirmed that none of the author have competing interests in the manuscript.
Publisher’s Note
Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Rights and permissions
Open Access This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made.
About this article
Cite this article
Ramli, Z.A.C., Kamarudin, S.K. Platinum-Based Catalysts on Various Carbon Supports and Conducting Polymers for Direct Methanol Fuel Cell Applications: a Review. Nanoscale Res Lett 13, 410 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1186/s11671-018-2799-4
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1186/s11671-018-2799-4
Keywords
- Direct methanol fuel cell
- Pt alloy
- Pt-based electrocatalyst
- Pt-transition metal
- Carbon support
- Conducting polymer support
- Methanol electrooxidation