Platinum dispersed on silica nanoparticle as electrocatalyst for PEM fuel cell

Colloidal silica has been employed as a support material to disperse Pt and develop Pt–SiO2 composites with electrocatalytic properties. The Pt–SiO2 particles of ratio 1:1 and 2:1 show superior performance towards oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) as these composite particles form an interconnected particle-network and maximize the available electrochemically active area. Upon increasing the Pt content we observe decreased activity as a result of aggregation of particles. The performance of Pt–SiO2 composite particles in H2-fuel cell are compared with Pt-black catalyst.