Spontaneous ORR activity Drop of Fe-N-C Catalysts Upon Atmospheric Storage
Résumé
Iron-Nitrogen-Carbon (Fe-N-C) catalysts are promising materials to replace the scarce and expensive platinum-group materials in proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFC) cathodes. Fe-N-C catalysts can be prepared by multiple ways [1-5], and each synthesis method can be fine-tuned to produce single Fe atoms coordinated to nitrogen atoms (FeN x), identified as the most active sites toward the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR). However, despite these notable efforts, a rapid drop in ORR activity is noticed within the first hours of