(135b) Platinum-Based Alloy And Intermetallic Nanostructures As Electrocatalysts For Methanol Oxidation And Oxygen Reduction Reactions

Platinum-based alloys and intermetallics have different electronic and catalytic properties when compared to their pure metal counterparts. It has been identified recently, based primarily on the thin film vapor-phase deposition studies, that platinum-containing intermetallic phases such as PtPb can show superior catalytic properties towards the electrooxidation of small organic molecules that are directly relevant to proton-exchange membrane fuel cells. For practical applications, structured alloys or intermetallics can potentially enhance their performance in the electrocatalytic reactions. This talk will discuss the use of nonhydrolytic colloidal methods in generating structurally and compositionally controlled platinum based nanoparticles. Besides alloy and intermetallic phases of PtM (M = Fe, Co, Ni, Rh, Pb, etc), I will describe the synthesis of several different kinds of heterogeneous and bimetallic nanostructures. The formation mechanism and the correlation between the structure and electrocatalytic property of these nanomaterials will be discussed using direct methanol oxidation and oxygen reduction as the model reactions.