Electrocatalytic processes (water splitting, fuel cell reactions, etc.) are poised to play an ever-increasing role in the world’s energy landscape going forward as means to generate and utilize clean, renewable fuels. Cheaper, more efficient electrocatalyst materials are needed for these processes. Nanostructured materials are attractive for these applications due to their high surface areas, but their inherent heterogeneity poses difficulties for fundamental studies into relationships between structure and reactivity. Here, the development and application of a novel analytical approach is described which relies on probing the electrocatalytic performance of individual, well-defined nanostructures. To accomplish this, a combination of high-resolution electrochemical measurements and optical spectroscopy will be employed to simultaneously provide information on the structure and electrocatalytic behavior of these structures. The application of the developed methodology to the study of hydrazine oxidation at well-defined Au nanoparticles of varying geometry will be presented.

A correlated optical and electrochemical approach to probing electrocatalysis at individual nanostructures

256th National Meeting (2018)

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