Electrooxidation of carbon monoxide and methanol on platinum-overlayer-coated gold nanoparticles: effects of film thickness

The electrooxidation of carbon monoxide and methanol on Pt-coated Au nanoparticles attached to 3-aminopropyl trimethoxysilane-modified indium tin oxide electrodes was examined as a function of Pt film thickness and Au particle coverage. For the electrodes with medium and high Au particle coverages, the CO stripping peak position shifts to more negative values with increasing Pt film thickness, from ca. 0.8 V (vs Ag/AgCl) at 1 ML to 0.45 V at 10 ML. Accompanying this peak potential shift is the sharpening of the peak width from more than 150 to 65 mV. For the electrode with low Au particle coverage, similar peak width narrowing was also observed, but the peak potential shift is much smaller, from 0.85 V at 1 ML of Pt to 0.65 V at 10 ML. These observations are compared with the CO oxidation on bulk Pt electrodes and on Pt films deposited on bulk Au electrodes. The film-thickness-dependent CO oxidation is explained by d band theory in terms of strain and ligand effects, the particle size effect, and the particle aggregation induced by Pt film growth. Corresponding to the increasing CO oxidation activity, the current density of methanol oxidation grows with the Pt film thickness. The peak potential and current density reach the same values as those obtained on a polycrystalline bulk Pt electrode when more than 4 ML of Pt is deposited on the Au particle electrodes with a particle coverage higher than 0.25. These results suggest that it is feasible to reduce Pt loading in methanol fuel cells by using Pt thin films as the anode catalyst.