Preparation of a platinum electrocatalyst by coaxial pulse arc plasma deposition

We have developed a new method of preparing Pt electrocatalysts through a dry process. By coaxial pulse arc plasma deposition (CAPD), highly ionized metal plasma can be generated from a target rod without any discharged gases, and Pt nanoparticles can be deposited on a carbon support. The small-sized Pt nanoparticles are distributed over the entire carbon surface. From transmission electron microscopy (TEM), the average size of the deposited Pt nanoparticles is estimated to be 2.5 nm, and their size distribution is narrow. Our electrocatalyst shows considerably improved catalytic activity and stability toward methanol oxidation reaction (MOR) compared with commercially available Pt catalysts such as Pt black and Pt/carbon (PtC). Inspired by its very high efficiency toward MOR, we also measured the catalytic performance for oxygen reduction reaction (ORR). Our PtC catalyst shows a better performance with half-wave potential of 0.87 V, which is higher than those of commercially available Pt catalysts. The higher performance is also supported by a right-shifted onset potential. Our preparation is simple and could be applied to other metallic nanocrystals as a novel platform in catalysis, fuel cells and biosensors.