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Experiments show spinach as a viable candidate for a new carbon catalyst in batteries
Spinach, a nutrient-filled green leafy vegetable, may have found its new purpose apart from providing energy to humans-providing a clean alternative to fuel cells and batteries.
Studies conducted by researchers in the Department of Chemistry at American University have shown that plants can be used as a catalyst for initiating redox reactions in metal-air and fuel cells by using them as a base for manufactured carbon nanosheets. it was done.Their work is published in the journal ACS Omega..
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El Centro, CA-January 25: On January 25, 2019, farmers mow weeds in organic spinach fields that grow near the US-Mexico border near El Centro, California.
A more environmentally friendly carbon alternative
The oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) of a fuel cell is one of the two major reactions that occur inside a fuel cell and a metal-air battery. This is usually a slower process and is the key to limiting the energy output that can be drawn from these devices. Press release from American University Note that researchers have previously known and identified carbon materials that can catalyze the reaction. However, carbon-based catalysts generally perform poorly compared to platinum-based catalysts.
This has led researchers to work on finding cheaper, less toxic and more efficient catalysts during the preparatory process. Finding readily available resources, they used spinach in their experiments.
“This study suggests that sustainable catalysts can be created for oxygen reduction reactions from natural resources,” said Shouzhong Zou, lead author of the study and professor of chemistry at AU.He explained that their method is produced using a “highly active carbon-based catalyst”. spinach, Renewable biomass, as a raw material.
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“In fact, we believe it is superior to commercially available platinum catalysts in both activity and stability. The catalyst has the potential to be applied to hydrogen fuel cells and metal-air batteries,” Zou added.
In batteries and fuel cells, the catalyst is the material that accelerates the chemical process (ORR in this case), produces enough current, and initiates the transfer of energy. Spinach is promising as a base material for making new catalysts because it is abundant, easy to regenerate, and survives at low temperatures. Spinach is also rich in iron and nitrogen, which are the elements needed to support the ORR process.
Manufacture of carbon catalyst
To create their new carbon catalyst material, researchers have incorporated spinach into a multi-step process that includes many steps, including blender squeezing, lyophilization, grinding, carbonization, and heat treatment. Next, tests were conducted to observe the ability to perform electrochemical reduction of oxygen. A quasi-rectangular voltammogram was observed in the nitrogen-doped sample, Capacitive charging current It was available in the sample. On the other hand, when the sample was saturated with oxygen, a strong reduction peak was observed.
Relation: A breakthrough concept for storing energy without a battery
The measurements obtained from the experiments showed that spinach-derived carbon nanosheets showed increased ORR activity compared to commercially available platinum-based catalysts. In addition, the carbon catalysts they produced showed better long-term stability and resistance to methanol compared to platinum, which deteriorates over time.
Based on these results, researchers believe that in addition to spinach, other plants capable of accumulating metals can be used as natural precursors for better heteroatom-doped carbon catalysts. In the future, researchers are considering using catalysts in prototype devices such as actual metal-air batteries and hydrogen fuel cells to better evaluate their performance.
Check out more news and information about spinach At Science Times.
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