Sacrificial Reducing Agent Free Photo-Generation of Platinum Nano Particle over Carbon/TiO2 for Highly Efficient Oxygen Reduction Reaction

Electrocatalytic materials for oxygen reduction reaction, currently dominated by platinum/carbon catalyst is marred by drawbacks such as use of copious amount of Pt and use of "non-green" sacrificial reducing agent (SRA) during its synthesis. A single stroke remedy for these two problems has been achieved through an in-situ aqueous photoreduction void of even trace amounts of SRA with an enhanced activity. Reduction of PtCl62- salt to Pt nano particles on carbon substrate was achieved solely using solar spectrum as the source of energy and TiO2 as photocatalyst. Here, we demonstrate that this new procedure of photoreduction, decorates Pt over different types of conducting allotropes with the distribution and the particle size primarily depending on the conductivity of the allotrope. The Pt/C/TiO2 composite unveiled an ORR activity on par to the most efficient Pt based electrocatalyst prepared through the conventional sacrificial reducing agent aided preparation methods.