• Journal of Hydrogen and New Energy
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• v.31 no.5
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• pp.444-452
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• 2020

This study investigated the cathode catalyst of direct borohydride/hydrogen peroxide fuel cells for space exploration. Various catalysts such as Au, Ag, and Ni were supported on multiwalled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs). Various techniques, such as transmission electron microscopy, Brunauer-Emmett-Teller method, scanning electron microscopy, and X-ray diffraction were conducted to investigate the characteristics of the catalysts. Fuel cell tests were performed to evaluate the performance of the catalysts. Ag/MWCNTs exhibited better catalytic activity than the Ni/MWCNTs and better catalytic selectivity of the Au/MWCNTs. Ag/MWCNTs presented good catalytic activity and selectivity even at an elevated operating temperature. The performance of Ag/MWCNTs was also stable for up to 60 minutes.

• Journal of the Korean Ceramic Society
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• v.52 no.5
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• pp.338-343
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• 2015

To prevent an interfacial reaction between the anode and the electrolyte layer during the conventional high-temperature co-firing process, an anode-supported type cell with a thin-film electrolyte was fabricated by low-temperature ceramic thick film coating process. Ni-GDC cermet composite was used as the anode material and YSZ was used as the electrolyte material. Open circuit voltage and maximum power density were found to strongly depend on the surface uniformity of the anode functional layer. By optimizing the microstructure of the anode functional layer, the open circuit voltage and maximum powder density of the cell increased to 1.11 V and $1.35W/cm^2$, respectively, at $750^{\circ}C$. When a GDC barrier layer was applied between the YSZ electrolyte and the LSCF cathode, the cell showed good stability, with almost no degradation up to 100 h. Anode-supported type SOFCs with high performance and good stability were fabricated using a coating process.

• Journal of the Korean Ceramic Society
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• v.42 no.4
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• pp.269-275
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• 2005

We analyzed the unit cell performance against the cathode porosity, which is supposed to be closely related with active sites for the cathode reaction. In order to fabricate the unit cells with different porosity in the cathode layer we changed the mixing ratio of fine and coarse LSCF cathode powders. The final porosity of each cathode layer was 14, 23, 27, $39\%$ respectively. According to the electrochemical analysis of unit cell performance via DC current interruption and AC impedance method, the electrodic polarization resistance was diminished as the cathode porosity increased. The decrease of polarization resistance was attributed due to the increase of active reaction sites and the enhancement of overall unit cell performance could be explained in the same line.

• Journal of the Korean Electrochemical Society
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• v.4 no.2
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• pp.58-64
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• 2001

YSZ ($8mol\%$ yttria-stabilized zirconia)-modified LSM $(La_{0.85}Sr_{0.15}MnO_3)$ composite cathodes were fabricated by formation of YSZ film on triple phase boundary (TPB) of LSM/YSZ/gas. The YSZ coating film greatly enlarged electrochemical reaction sites from the increase of additional TPB. The composite cathode was formed on thin YSZ electrolyte (about 30 Um thickness) supported on an anode and then I-V characterization and AC impedance analyses were performed at temperature between $700^{\circ}C\;and\;800^{\circ}C$. As results of the impedance analysis on the cell at $800^{\circ}C$ with humidified hydrogen as the fuel and air as the oxidant, R1 around the frequency of 1000 Hz represents the anode Polarization. R2 around the frequency of 100Hz indicates the cathode polarization, and R3 below the frequency of 10 Hz is the resistance of gas phase diffusion through the anode. The cell with the composite cathode produced power density of $0.55\;W/cm^2\;and\;1W/cm^2$ at air and oxygen atmosphere, respectively. The I-V curve could be divided into two parts showing distinctive behavior. At low current density region (part I) the performance decreased steeply and at high current density region (part II) the performance decreased gradually. At the part I the performance decrease was especially resulted from the large cathode polarization, while at the part H the performance decrease related to the electrolyte polarization.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2009.06a
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• pp.379-381
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• 2009

The simulation model for metal-supported Solid Oxide Fuel Cell(SOFC) is developed in this study. Open circuit voltage is calculated using Nernst equation and Gibbs free energy is required by thermodynamic. The exchange current densities are compared with experimental results since exchange current density is most effective factor for the activation loss. Liu's study is used for the exchange current density of cathode, BSCF, and Koide's result is applied for the exchange current density of anode, Ni/YSZ. For the ohmic loss, ionic conductivity of YSZ is described from Kilner's mode and the data are compared with Wanzenberg's experimental data. Diffusivity is an important factor for the mass transfer through the porous medium. Both binary diffusion and Knudsen diffusion are considered as the diffusion mechanism. For validation, simulation results at this work are compared with our experimental results.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.25 no.7
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• pp.1114-1118
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• 2015

Microbial fuel cells (MFCs) have gathered attention as a novel bioenergy technology to simultaneously treat wastewater with less sludge production than the conventional activated sludge system. In two different operations of the MFC and aerobic process, microbial growth was determined by the protein assay method and their biomass yields using real wastewater were compared. The biomass yield on the anode electrode of the MFC was 0.02 g-COD-cell/gCOD-substrate and the anolyte planktonic biomass was 0.14 g-COD-cell/g-COD-substrate. An MFC without anode electrode resulted in the biomass yield of 0.07 ± 0.03 g-COD-cell/g-CODsubstrate, suggesting that oxygen diffusion from the cathode possibly supported the microbial growth. In a comparative test, the biomass yield under aerobic environment was 0.46 ± 0.07 g-COD-cell/g-COD-substrate, which was about 3 times higher than the total biomass value in the MFC operation.

• Korean Journal of Metals and Materials
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• v.47 no.7
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• pp.454-459
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• 2009

In order to commercialize Polymer Electrolyte Fuel Cell (PEFC), the cathode catalyst such as Platinum supported Carbon (Pt/C) need to have a high activity of Oxygen Reduction Reaction (ORR). In this study, the 20% Pt/C was synthesized using the chemical reduction method while the crystallinity of Platinum (Pt) particles were controlled under heat treatment conditions. The activity of synthesized Pt catalysts was evaluated using electrochemical measurement. Compared with the $i_{ORR}$ at 0.8 V of 20% Pt/C heat-treated at $500^{\circ}C$ and the 20% Pt/C that were not heated and commercial 20% Pt/C, the $i_{ORR}$ at 0.8 V of 20% Pt/C heattreated at $500^{\circ}C$ was 9.5 and 1.7 times higher than those of the 20% Pt/C and commercial 20% Pt/C that were not heated. It was considered that the crystallinity and particle size affect the ORR activity of the Pt/C catalysts.

• Journal of the Korean Electrochemical Society
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• v.15 no.3
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• pp.198-205
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• 2012

Carbon-supported manganese oxide composite were fabricated as an air cathode material for Li-air batteries by hydrothermal method. The composite materials of carbon and manganese oxide were investigated by the implementation of X-ray diffraction, FE-SEM and BET surface area measurer. The manganese oxide synthesized at $170^{\circ}C$ for 12 h has a rod like shape morphology with 40-50 nm long in size. A Lithium-air battery with coin type, of which electrodes are composed of cathode composite materials synthesized $170^{\circ}C$-12 h and lithium metal anode, reveals its first discharge capacity of 3,852 mAh/g and four discharge-charge cycles.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.13 no.3
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• pp.160-168
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• 2003

The co-firing processes for the supported type planar solid oxide fuel cell were investigated. A flat cell of $7.7${\times}$10.8\textrm{cm}^2$ was fabricated successfully by the co-firing process, in which green films were co-sintered in the forms of two layers of anode/electrolyte or of three layers of anode/electrolyte/cathode with gas distributor. A co-fired cell of two layers yielded a power of 200 ㎽/$\textrm{cm}^2$ at 608 ㎷. Its performance loss was mainly due to iR drop in the anodic gas distributor, which was attributed to poor contact between anodic gas distributor and current collector. The performance in the co-fired cell of three layers was much lower than that of two layers, which resulted from the large iR drop and activation overvoltage at the cathodic side. In the co-fired cell of two layers, the impedance analysis indicated that the performance decay during cell operation is due to both anode overvoltage and iR drop at anode side. Also the electrode reaction of the co-fired two layers' cell is considered to be controlled by activation overvoltage within the low current of 50 ㎃.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2009.06a
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• pp.295-298
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• 2009

Oxygen ionic conductors of CeScSZ electrolyte in SOFC unit cell are applied to anode and cathode as well as electrolyte to have the triple-phase-boundaries of electrochemical reaction, and it is required to decrease the sintering temperature of anode-supported electrolyte by the nanoscale of CeScSZ electrolyte powder. In this report, nanoscale CeScSZ electrolyte powder was synthesized by chemical synthesis method. The particle size, surface area and morphology of the powder were observed by SEM and BET. Thin film electrolyte of under $10{\mu}m$ was fabricated by tape casting using the synthesized CeScSZ electrolyte powder, and ionic conductivity and gas permeability of electrolyte film were evaluated. Finally the SOFC unit cell was fabricated using the anode-supported electrolyte prepared by a tape casting method and co-sintering, in which the active layer, measuring $20{\mu}m$, was introduced in the anode layer to provide a more efficient reaction. Electrochemical evaluations of the SOFC unit cell, including measurements such as power density and impedance, were performed and analyzed.