GOALI: One Step Direct Deposition of Durable Cathode for High Temperature Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cell (PEMFC)

这一学术与工业联系机会(GOALI)奖将使科学探索和实现创新的制造方法，将新的催化剂和电极结构沉积到高温质子交换膜上。这项工作中采用的方法将允许在单个基于火焰的反应喷射沉积步骤中对成分和结构参数进行独立控制，大大减少了传统工艺所需的制造步骤数量。这将使以低制造成本生产高性能的质子交换膜燃料电池成为可能。在这项工作中，该团队将量化加工条件对催化剂和电极结构的影响，并将利用这些信息来发现加工可以将活性提高到的基本极限。为了实现这一目标，该团队将研究工艺参数对颗粒形成、催化剂利用率和形态的影响。此外，还将研究载体和电极层厚度对催化剂利用率和耐久性的影响。高比表面积催化剂的电化学表征将从三个层次进行：催化剂、非原位电极和原位电极。这些信息将被用来研究作为氧还原电催化剂设计工具的电化学Thiele模数。在教育方面，这笔赠款将为高中生和教师以及本科生和研究生提供可持续能源、制造和电化学工程领域的实践经验和培训。这笔助学金还将为学生在工业合作伙伴Sonalysts的工业实习提供机会。如果成功，这项研究的结果将导致商业规模电极的电化学活性和催化剂利用率的提高。这项研究还将为下一代结构的合理设计提供关键的结构性能信息。这项研究还将重点放在实验室规模的发现和大规模催化剂纳米制造之间的桥梁，使我们的工业合作伙伴Sonalysts能够快速实施。结构-性质信息的实现和放大将进一步降低电活性材料的成本，提高其在多个平台上的性能稳定性。拟议项目的直接商业衍生产品包括：一种新的、可扩展的催化剂合成工艺；高温质子交换膜燃料电池的配方；以及混合燃料电池潜水器。虽然这个项目的重点是燃料电池，但其成果一般可以应用于电池、传感器和催化剂。

This Grant Opportunity for Academic Liaison with Industry (GOALI) award will enable scientific inquiry and realization of innovative manufacturing methods to deposit new catalyst and electrode structures onto high temperature proton exchange membranes. The approach taken in this work will allow for independent control over compositional and structural parameters in a single flame-based reactive spray deposition step, significantly reducing the number of manufacturing steps that are required with traditional processes. This will enable high performing proton exchange membrane fuel cells to be produced at low manufacturing cost. In this work, the team will quantify the impact of processing conditions on the catalyst and electrode structure, and will use this information to discover the fundamental limits to which processing can push activity. To accomplish this, the team will study the influence of processing parameters on particle formation, catalyst utilization and morphology. Additionally, the influence of the support and electrode layer thickness on catalyst utilization and durability will be studied. Electrochemical characterization of the high surface area catalysts will be performed on three levels: catalyst, ex-situ electrodes, and in-situ electrodes. This information will be used to study the electrochemical Thiele modulus as a design tool for oxygen reduction electrocatalysts. Educationally, this grant will provide high school students and teachers as well as undergraduate and graduate students with hands-on experience and training in the fields of sustainable energy, manufacturing and electrochemical engineering. The grant will also provide opportunities for student internships in industry with the industrial partner Sonalysts. If successful, the results of this research will lead to improvements in the electrochemical activity and catalyst utilization of commercial-scale electrodes. This research will also provide critical structure-property information for the rational design of next-generation structures. This research will also focus on bridging laboratory-scale discovery and large scale catalyst nanomanufacturing, allowing for rapid implementation by our industrial partner, Sonalysts. Implementation and scale-up of the structure-property information will further reduce the cost and improve the performance stability of electroactive materials in several platforms. Immediate commercial derivatives of the proposed project include: a novel, scalable catalyst synthesis process; formulations for high temperature proton exchange membrane fuel cells; and hybrid fuel-cell battery submersibles. Although this project is focused on fuel cells, the results can be implemented toward batteries, sensors and catalysts in general.