Commercialization of a polymer electrolyte fuel cell (PEMFC) is confronted with insufficient activity and durability of Pt-based cathode catalyst. Therefore, catalyst development for oxygen reduction has been focused on the increase of the specific activity of Pt-based catalysts by alloying Pt with transition metals. Computationally based electrocatalyst screening has made it possible to reduce the efforts for finding cathode catalysts with high activity and durability. According to the computationally predicted oxygen binding energy for Pt-based alloys, Pt₃Zn has the nearly optimal oxygen binding energy for oxygen reduction.¹ However, there is still lack of information on Pt₃Zn as a cathode catalyst in a PEMFC. Here, we synthesized uniform Pt-Zn nanoparticles in oleylamine that has an average size of 4 nm. After deposition of Pt-Zn nanoparticles on a carbon support, the resulting material was heat-treated at higher than 400 ^oC. The electrocatalytic properties of Pt-Zn nanoparticles and the heat-treatment effect will be presented.

[1] J. Greeley et al. Nature Chemistry 2009, 1, 552.