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Updated: May 17, 2026

Synthesis of Platinum-nickel Nanowires and Optimization for Oxygen Reduction Performance
Published on: April 27, 2018
Octahedral PtNi nanoparticle catalysts: exceptional oxygen reduction activity by tuning the alloy particle surface
Chunhua Cui1, Lin Gan, Hui-Hui Li
1The Electrochemical Energy, Catalysis, and Materials Science Laboratory, Department of Chemistry, Chemical Engineering Division, Technical University Berlin, Berlin 10623, Germany.
Abstract:
We demonstrate how shape selectivity and optimized surface composition result in exceptional oxygen reduction activity of octahedral PtNi nanoparticles (NPs). The alloy octahedra were obtained by utilizing a facile, completely surfactant-free solvothermal synthesis. We show that the choice of precursor ligands controls the shape, while the reaction time tunes the surface Pt:Ni composition. The 9.5 nm sized PtNi octahedra reached a 10-fold surface area-specific (~3.14 mA/cm(Pt)(2)) as well as an unprecedented 10-fold Pt mass based (~1.45 A/mg(Pt)) activity gain over the state-of-art Pt electrocatalyst, approaching the theoretically predicted limits.
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