We will present our recent study on a Cu-assisted synthesis of Pd-Cu bimetallic tripods with purity higher than 90%. The tripods have high-density surface steps on their highly accessible surfaces and the arms were shown to grow along three  directions. We have confirmed that the tripods were made of a Pd-Cu alloy through XRD and EDS analysis. We systematically investigated the role of Cu in the formation of the tripod structure. The incorporation of Cu in the tripods was caused by the formation of Cu UPD layer on the Pd seeds since the tripods evolved from plate-like seeds with stacking faults or twin planes. We also found that KBr played a key role in the overgrowth of triangular seeds to tripods. The Br- ions could strongly bind to the three (100) side surfaces of triangular plates, forcing the Pd atoms to deposit on the three corners of the plate-like seeds to generate the tripods. When compared with the commercial Pd black catalyst, the Pd-Cu tripods exhibited substantially enhanced (eight times per unit mass of Pd) catalytic activity toward the electro-oxidation of formic acid. This study demonstrates a new way to overcome the high free energy of plate-like seeds and it provided a new direction for the synthesis of nanocrystals with plat-like or plate-evolved morphologies.

Facile synthesis of Pd-Cu bimetallic tripods and their use as catalysts for formic acid oxidation

248th National Meeting (2014)

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