New nanocomposites with an ordered structure for application in solid oxide cells

by Oriol Roig

A paper published in “Nature Communications” discusses the development of a novel class of functional materials based on nano-engineered composite oxides. The ICN2 Nanomaterials Growth Unit participated in this work.

A study led by ICREA Prof. Albert Tarancón and Dr Federico Baiutti, both members of the Nanoionics and Fuel Cells Group at the Catalonia Institute for Energy Research (IREC), titled “A high-entropy manganite in an ordered nanocomposite for long-term application in solid oxide cells”, was recently published in Nature Communications. This paper is a collaborative effort between IREC, University of Cambridge (UK), Colorado School of Mines (USA), Coventry University (UK), ICN2-CSIC-BIST (Spain), Purdue University (USA) and Imperial College London (UK). The ICN2 performed the x-ray diffraction (XRD) measurements needed for the research, which were carried out at the Nanomaterials Growth Unit, led by Dr José Santiso.

The article reports on the development of a novel class of functional materials with enhanced electrochemical properties based on nano-engineered composite oxides. This new structure is characterized by a coherent, dense array of vertical interfaces at the nanoscale. The authors used several different techniques, including physical vapour deposition, atom-probe tomography combined with oxygen isotopic exchange, and density functional theory calculations, to characterize all the interesting properties of this new material.

Read the full news here:

A high-entropy nanostructure for Solid Oxide Cells - IREC

Reference article:

F. Baiutti, F. Chiabrera, M. Acosta, D. Diercks, D. Parfitt, J. Santiso, X. Wang, A. Cavallaro, A. Morata, H. Wang, A. Chroneos, J. MacManus-Driscoll and A. Tarancon, A high-entropy manganite in an ordered nanocomposite for long-term application in solid oxide cells. Nat. Commun. 12, 2660 (2021). DOI: 10.1038/s41467-021-22916-4