Non-carbon 1D mesoporous titanium vanadium nitride as supports of Pt nanoparticles for methanol electrooxidation

In this work, one dimensional (1D) hybrid Ti0.8V0.2N nanotubes (Ti0.8V0.2N NTs) is prepared by a facile synthesis procedure and used as support for Pt nanoparticles (Pt/Ti0.8V0.2N NTs). The novel support is characterized by XRD, N-2 adsorption-desorption, SEM, and TEM, which show that the 1D Ti0.8V0.2N NTs is composed of homogeneous cohesively small crystals, and the nanotubes possess rough surface with porous structures, thus, Ti0.8V0.2N NTs have high surface area. The XPS results show that the interaction of Pt and support is enhanced owing to the V element doping. Most importantly, electrochemical experiments demonstrate that the Pt/Ti0.8V0.2N NTs possess low charge transfer resistance, excellent catalytic activity and superior durability for MOR, and exhibits better capability of resistance for CO poisoning than that of commercial Pt/C. These results indicate that the robust Ti0.8V0.2N NTs as support have a splendid future in direct methanol fuel cells (DMFC). (C) 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.