Pt-AlOOH-SiO2/graphene hybrid nanomaterial with very high electrocatalytic performance for methanol oxidation

Hybrid materials comprising of Pt dispersed on AlOOH, SiO₂ doped graphene are successfully synthesized. The structure and morphology of the catalysts are characterized by X-ray diffraction, TEM, HRTEM and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. Their electrocatalytic properties are investigated by cyclic voltammetry, chronoamperometry and chronopotentiometry. The experimental results show that the presence of AlOOH and SiO₂ favors the Pt nanoparticles dispersion on the graphene sheets. This greatly improves the electrocatalytic activities of Pt/graphene catalysts for methanol oxidation. In particular, the catalyst containing 7% of Al and Si exhibits the best electrocatalytic performance for methanol oxidation with mass activity of 1720 mA mg^-1. Therefore, Pt-AlOOH-SiO₂/graphene hybrid is shown to be an effective catalyst for fuel cell application.