2019 Fiscal Year Research-status Report
Precise tuning of electronic state of IrO2 by tailor-made conjugated polymer substrate for water electrolysis
Project/Area Number |
19K15674
|
Research Institution | Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology |
Principal Investigator |
Badam Rajashekar 北陸先端科学技術大学院大学, 先端科学技術研究科, 助教 (10794670)
|
Project Period (FY) |
2019-04-01 – 2021-03-31
|
Keywords | OER / Acidic medium / Iridium oxide / Polythiophene |
Outline of Annual Research Achievements |
TiO2 nanotube array (TNT), IrO2 decorated TNT, Polythiophene-TNT(PTh-TNT), IrO2 decorated PTh-TNT (IrO2-PTh-TNT) were prepared and characterized using XRD, SEM, SEM-EDS and XPS. Electrochemical results showed that IrO2-PTh-TNT has 4.2 times higher catalytic activity than that of TNT-IrO2 toward oxygen evolution reaction (OER). The overpotential was reduced by 500 mV after improving the electronic conductivity by introducing PTh. Successfully prepared a novel bis(4-(thiophen-2-ylethynyl)phenyl)acenaphthylene-1,2-diimine)and its Ir complex. These two materials were successfully characterized by NMR, FTIR, UV-Vis spectroscopies and XPS. Further other variants of thiophene monomers are under preparation. Decoration of IrO2 and OER studies are planned for the next year. Results are promising.
|
Current Status of Research Progress |
Current Status of Research Progress
2: Research has progressed on the whole more than it was originally planned.
Reason
Our work is proceeding as per the proposed plan. The only time taking step in the current plan is to make various thiophene monomers with varying functional groups. Currently one novel monomer was made and well characterized. Its Ir complex was already made and nanoparticles will be further made using these complex as nucleation sites. The initial results are very promising and we will succeed as per the planned proposal. Further there is another small challenge in measuring the oxygen evolved in OER reaction by using gas chromatography. The problem was found to be the lack of air tight electrochemical cell. We are in the process of designing an air tight cell and it will be ready a month or two.
|
Strategy for Future Research Activity |
In the next phase IrO2 nanoparticles will be be grown over Ir-novel polythiophene complex to establish electronic interaction between polythiophene and IrO2 nanoparticles. Further we will establish the gas chromatography method to measure exact amount of oxygen that will be evolved at anode and correlate with the anodic current. Currently we plan to make at least 3 novel thiophene monomers with varying electron pumping and withdrawing groups to modulate the electron cloud over the nanoparticles to understand structure activity relation.
|
Causes of Carryover |
The design of airtight electrochemical cell is underway. So, the remaining amount will utilized for this purpose in the following year.
|