Meso-Structured Silica-Nafion Hybrid Membranes for Direct Methanol Fuel Cells

Sahu, AK and Meenakshi, S and Bhat, SD and Shahid, A and Sridhar, P and Pitchumani, S and Shukla, AK (2012) Meso-Structured Silica-Nafion Hybrid Membranes for Direct Methanol Fuel Cells. In: JOURNAL OF THE ELECTROCHEMICAL SOCIETY, 159 (11). F702-F710.

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Abstract

A series of novel organic-inorganic hybrid membranes have been prepared employing Nafion and acid-functionalized meso-structured molecular sieves (MMS) with varying structures and surface area. Acid-functionalized silica nanopowder of surface area 60 m(2)/g, silica meso-structured cellular foam (MSU-F) of surface area 470 m(2)/g and silica meso-structured hexagonal frame network (MCM-41) of surface area 900 m(2)/g have been employed as potential filler materials to form hybrid membranes with Nafion framework. The structural behavior, water uptake, proton conductivity and methanol permeability of these hybrid membranes have been investigated. DMFCs employing Nafion-silica MSU-F and Nafion-silica MCM-41 hybrid membranes deliver peak-power densities of 127 mW/cm(2) and 100 mW/cm(2), respectively; while a peak-power density of only 48 mW/cm(2) is obtained with the DMFC employing pristine recast Nafion membrane under identical operating conditions. The aforesaid characteristics of the hybrid membranes could be exclusively attributed to the presence of pendant sulfonic acid groups in the filler, which provide fairly continuous proton-conducting pathways between filler and matrix in the hybrid membranes facilitating proton transport without any trade-off between its proton conductivity and methanol crossover. (C) 2012 The Electrochemical Society. DOI: 10.1149/2.036211jes] All rights reserved.

Item Type:	Journal Article
Publication:	JOURNAL OF THE ELECTROCHEMICAL SOCIETY
Publisher:	ELECTROCHEMICAL SOC INC
Additional Information:	Copyright for this article belongs to the ELECTROCHEMICAL SOC INC
Department/Centre:	Division of Chemical Sciences > Solid State & Structural Chemistry Unit
Date Deposited:	31 Jan 2013 12:44
Last Modified:	31 Jan 2013 12:44
URI:	http://eprints.iisc.ac.in/id/eprint/45302

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