Biomolecular guided synthesis of fuel cell catalysts

Abstract

This work is aimed at producing nanoscale bimetallic particles that are active in fuel cell electrocatalysis, using DNA as design templates to guide the material synthesis. The experimental results revealed the presence of strong non-specific interaction between the oligonucleotide backbone and the surface of the small metal nanoparticles. Two methods have been suggested as possible solutions to overcome the non-specific adsorption of oligonucleotides on small metal nanoparticles. One is based on the use of stabilizer molecules which compete with the oligonucleotides for adsorption on the metal nanoparticle surface. The second approach is to simply use larger metal particles. A core-shell assisted method was developed to enable the assembly of platinum and ruthenium nanoparticles by DNA hybridization. The key feature is the use of core-shell construction to artificially increase the apparent platinum and ruthenium particle size to reduce the nonspecific interaction between single stranded DNA and the metal nanoparticle surface.