TY - JOUR
T1 - Nanoscale engineering to control mass transfer on carbon-based electrodes
AU - Pascual, Laura Ferrer
AU - Pande, Ishan
AU - Kousar, Ayesha
AU - Rantataro, Samuel
AU - Laurila, Tomi
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 The Author(s)
PY - 2022/7
Y1 - 2022/7
N2 - Here we use an electrode consisting of carbon nanofibers (CNFs), the lengths and surface population density of which can be effectively controlled. It is shown that (i) a thin liquid layer forms when the thickness of the diffusion layer has a specific ratio to the dimensions of the nanostructured carbon surface. (ii) This leads to a decrease in the peak potential difference and a subsequent increase in the apparent heterogeneous electron transfer (HET) constant, both of which could be interpreted as a result of increased catalytic activity. (iii) However, we show that this explanation is not likely, as our materials are chemically identical, and we use an outer sphere redox (OSR) probe to minimize any specific chemical interactions. On the contrary, (iv) the results clearly show that the observed behavior is caused by a combination of the formation of a thin liquid layer and the increased apparent surface area of the electrodes.
AB - Here we use an electrode consisting of carbon nanofibers (CNFs), the lengths and surface population density of which can be effectively controlled. It is shown that (i) a thin liquid layer forms when the thickness of the diffusion layer has a specific ratio to the dimensions of the nanostructured carbon surface. (ii) This leads to a decrease in the peak potential difference and a subsequent increase in the apparent heterogeneous electron transfer (HET) constant, both of which could be interpreted as a result of increased catalytic activity. (iii) However, we show that this explanation is not likely, as our materials are chemically identical, and we use an outer sphere redox (OSR) probe to minimize any specific chemical interactions. On the contrary, (iv) the results clearly show that the observed behavior is caused by a combination of the formation of a thin liquid layer and the increased apparent surface area of the electrodes.
KW - Carbon nanomaterials
KW - Nanofibers
KW - Outer-sphere redox probe
KW - Thin-layer diffusion
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85134684575&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.elecom.2022.107328
DO - 10.1016/j.elecom.2022.107328
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85134684575
SN - 1388-2481
VL - 140
JO - Electrochemistry Communications
JF - Electrochemistry Communications
M1 - 107328
ER -