Graphene and graphene doped surface as metal free catalyst for oxygen reduction reaction

The rising global energy demand and environmental impact of traditional energy resources pose serious challenges to human health, energy security, and environmental protection. One promising solution is fuel cell technology, which provides clean and sustainable power. Fuel cell as energy conversion technology currently receives intensive research and development focus because of its high energy conversion efficiency, virtually no pollution, and potential large-scale applications. However, fuel cells require a catalyst for oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) (∼0.4 mg cm−2). Thus, efforts are needed to identify alternative catalysts that are readily available, cost effective, and show comparable or even better catalytic effects than Pt for cathodic oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) in fuel cells. Recent intensive research efforts have led to the development of less expensive and more abundant electro-catalysts for fuel cells. In particular, it was found that vertically aligned carbon allotrope can act as a metal-free electrode to catalyze an ORR process with a 3-times higher electrocatalytic activity and better long-term operational stability than that of commercially available platinum/C electrodes (e.g., C2−20, 20% platinum on Vulcan XC-72R; E-TEK) in alkaline fuel cells. One of the promising alternatives is graphene and graphene based materials for ORR. This lecture aims to present recent advances for electrocatalysis in oxygen reduction, with a particular focus on graphene as a rising star material including graphene surface, graphene top down synthesis, diagnostic tools characterization, graphene doped with heteroatoms. Finally, we present electrochemical response of oxygen reduction reaction on the graphene and graphene doped heteroatom for ORR. On the other hand we report the F- Cl- and N- doped in RGO by chemical and one pot electrochemical step to obtain graphene-based high performance metal-free ORR electrocatalysts and also better price/performance ratio than any other ORR electrocatalysts.