Nanocomposite electrodes based on pre-synthesized organically capped platinum nanoparticles and carbon nanotubes. Part I: Tuneable low platinum loadings, specific H upd feature and evidence for oxygen reduction

A bottom-up approach is used here to combine carbon nanotubes synthesized by CVD and organically capped platinum nanoparticles electrocatalyst exhibiting a direct electrochemical activity towards oxygen reduction. Both nano-objects are handled in liquid suspension and are associated together in a controlled way. The nanocomposite liquid dispersions can be precisely controlled in terms of platinum nanoparticles to carbon nanotubes weight ratios (NP/NT) which correspond to different coverages of nanotubes by nanoparticles. Electrodes with low to ultra-low platinum loadings can then be prepared on porous fuel cell carbon supports by filtration. The direct electrochemical activity towards aqueous oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) of electrodes with platinum loadings ranging from about 1 to 60 mu g/cm(2) is reported without any activation step in order to keep the features of the nanoparticles intact. Before that, we studied the responses obtained when impregnating our hydrophobic electrodes by a voltamperometric gas consumption procedure. These responses are also dependent of the composition of our electrodes. Whereas our results are of particular interest with respect to the optimization of platinum loading in fuel cell electrodes, the specific behaviour of these capped platinum nanoparticles towards proton adsorption-desorption reveals the difficulty to determine reliable active surface area with related regard to the platinum loading and point to the necessity to determine other characteristic parameters for the electrodes. (C) 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.