FeOOH-Templated synthesis of hollow porous platinum nanotubes as superior electrocatalysts towards methanol electrooxidation

• Published in: New journal of chemistry Vol. 41; no. 17; pp. 8812 - 8817
• Main Authors: Sun, Hao, Qi, Lijuan, Jiang, Xian, Fu, Gengtao, Xu, Lin, Sun, Dongmei, Gu, Zhenggui, Tang, Yawen
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: 2017
• ISSN: 1144-0546; 1369-9261
• DOI: 10.1039/C7NJ01755C

Metallic nanomaterials with a hollow and porous structure have attracted a great deal of interest in electrocatalysis due to their high surface area, abundant active-sites and improved metal utilization efficiency. Herein, we report an effective layer-by-layer assembly strategy to prepare a novel type of hollow porous Pt nanotube (Pt-NT) using polyelectrolyte-modified FeOOH nanorods as templates. To our knowledge, the utilization of FeOOH nanorods as templates to synthesise hollow porous Pt nanostructures has not been reported. The obtained Pt-NTs present the combined merits of a one-dimensional (1D) hollow architecture, a reactant accessible porous-surface and a large surface area (37.8 m 2 g −1 ). As a result, superior catalytic activity and stability for the methanol oxidation reaction (MOR) are achieved with the Pt-NTs as an anode catalyst. Compared to a commercial Pt-black catalyst, the Pt-NTs exhibit a factor of 1.4 and 1.2 enhancement in mass activity (231 A g −1 ) and specific activity (11.8 A m −2 ) for the MOR, respectively.