Effect of Subsurface Vacancies on Oxygen Reduction Reaction Activity of Pt-Based Alloys Academic Article uri icon

abstract

  • Density functional theory is used to evaluate geometric and electronic effects of the presence of vacancies in subsurface layers of Pt-based alloys composed by a monolayer of Pt on top of an alloy core for bimetallic Pt/PtM/Pt 3M (M = Co, Pd, Ir, Cu) and trimetallic Pt/M1 3M2 (M1, M2 = Pd, Cu; M1 M2) systems. Our model simulates metal porous structures arising after dealloying due to exposure of metal nanoparticles to oxidative conditions in acid medium. Enhanced oxygen reduction reaction activity experimentally observed in these structures is tested through the calculation of binding energies of O and OH. It is found that subsurface vacancies induce relatively weaker binding energies of O and especially of OH, and reduced Pt-Pt surface distances, which can explain the observed activity enhancement. 2012 American Chemical Society.

published proceedings

  • JOURNAL OF PHYSICAL CHEMISTRY C

author list (cited authors)

  • Callejas-Tovar, R., & Balbuena, P. B.

citation count

  • 31

complete list of authors

  • Callejas-Tovar, Rafael||Balbuena, Perla B

publication date

  • July 2012