Researchers from the National Institute of Chemistry, the University of Ljubljana, the Jožef Stefan Institute, and the University of Nova Gorica have investigated the impact of a structural anomaly in hydrogen fuel cell catalysts on their performance. The study confirms that the performance of the investigated catalyst is robust to the presence of certain structural anomalies and thus contributes to a deeper understanding of the structure-property relationships of such functional materials.

For this purpose, the authors of the study prepared platinum-copper-alloy nanoparticles with periodic anti-phase boundaries. These are irregularities in the structure that can occur during thermal annealing, one of the common steps during the preparation of such catalysts. The average distribution of these defects was determined by X-ray powder diffraction, and their occurrence was monitored at different annealing temperatures. The structure was confirmed by other methods and the catalytic performance of the material was measured. It was confirmed that the presence of anti-phase boundaries has no negative effect on the oxygen reduction reaction.

The publication is available in open access at: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.mtnano.2023.100377