Effect of precursor’s proportion on the properties of 8YSZ nanoparticles as an electrolyte for SOFCs

Current developments in SOFCs concentrate mainly on increase the durability and lowering the cost of the system and materials therein. A way to reach this goal is to decrease the operating temperature without incurring performance losses rather than further increasing the performance of the cell [1]. SOFCs are composed of three parts: cathode (air electrode), electrolyte, and anode (fuel electrode). The solid oxide electrolyte must isolate the two gas phases (fuel and air) from each other and transport oxygen ions, reduced in cathode, without significant losses from the cathode to anode. Therefore, electrolytes need to be a sufficiently fast oxygen ion conductor [1-2]. The transport of oxygen ions in the electrolyte occurs via oxygen vacancies in the oxygen sublattice. The concentration of vacancies and their mobility determines the electrolyte ion conductivities. Among number of metal oxides ion conductors may refer to zirconia stabilized with yittria in the conductive cubic phase (YSZ) [1]. Several chemical and physical methods have been devised to synthesize cubic ZrO2, such as thermal decomposition, chemical evaporation, sol-gel methods, precipitation and co-precipitation from a solution and hydrothermal techniques [3].