High Temperature Fabrication of Nanostructured Yttria-Stabilized-Zirconia (YSZ) Scaffolds by In Situ Carbon Templating Xerogels

Summary

A protocol for fabricating porous, nanostructured yttria-stabilized-zirconia (YSZ) scaffolds at temperatures between 1,000 °C and 1,400 °C is presented.

Abstract

We demonstrate a method for the high temperature fabrication of porous, nanostructured yttria-stabilized-zirconia (YSZ, 8 mol% yttria - 92 mol% zirconia) scaffolds with tunable specific surface areas up to 80 m²·g^-1. An aqueous solution of a zirconium salt, yttrium salt, and glucose is mixed with propylene oxide (PO) to form a gel. The gel is dried under ambient conditions to form a xerogel. The xerogel is pressed into pellets and then sintered in an argon atmosphere. During sintering, a YSZ ceramic phase forms and the organic components decompose, leaving behind amorphous carbon. The carbon formed in situ serves as a hard template, preserving a high surface area YSZ nanomorphology at sintering temperature. The carbon is subsequently removed by oxidation in air at low temperature, resulting in a porous, nanostructured YSZ scaffold. The concentration of the carbon template and the final scaffold surface area can be systematically tuned by varying the glucose concentration in the gel synthesis. The carbon template concentration was quantified using thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), the surface area and pore size distribution was determined by physical adsorption measurements, and the morphology was characterized using scanning electron microscopy (SEM). Phase purity and crystallite size was determined using X-ray diffraction (XRD). This fabrication approach provides a novel, flexible platform for realizing unprecedented scaffold surface areas and nanomorphologies for ceramic-based electrochemical energy conversion applications, e.g. solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) electrodes.

Introduction

The solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) holds great promise as an alternative energy conversion technology for the efficient generation of clean electrical power.¹ Considerable progress has been made in the research and development of this technology; however, improvements in electrode performance are still needed to achieve reliable commercialization. The electrode often comprises a porous ceramic scaffold with electrocatalytic particles decorated on the scaffold surface. A large body of research has focused on increasing the surface area of the electrocatalytic particles to increase performance,^2,....

Protocol

1. Preparing Xerogel Pellets

1. Gel Synthesis
   1. Add a 25 mm magnetic stir bar and 113 mL of deionized water to a 500 mL beaker. Magnetically stir the deionized water at the highest rate that does not form a vortex.
   2. Slowly add 13.05 g (0.056 mol) of anhydrous zirconium chloride to the deionized water in small increments. After all of the anhydrous zirconium chloride has dissolved, add 53.29 g (0.296 mol) of glucose to the solution.
   3. After all of the glucose has dissolved in the solution, add 3.73 g (0.01 mol) of yttrium nitrate hexahydrate to the solution. Increase the rate of magnetic stirring to ~700 rpm and wait for all of the....

Results

Phase purity was confirmed by X-ray diffraction (XRD) as previously reported by Cottam et al.¹⁴ YSZ scaffold specific surface area as a function of carbon template concentration is shown in Figure 1. The concentration is shown as the volume percent of total solids in the sintered xerogel pellet. The carbon template concentration systematically increases with increasing glucose concentration in the gel formulation. As shown in Figur.......

Discussion

With this in situ carbon templating approach, one can create and preserve nanomorphology in mixed-metal-oxides at traditional ceramic scaffold sintering temperatures. The resulting surface areas are up to 80 times higher than traditionally sintered scaffolds and up to 4 times higher than scaffolds fabricated by complex deposition techniques.¹⁴ The propylene oxide-glucose gel system is highly flexible for tuning the concentration of the carbon template, allowing one to systematically contr.......

Materials

List of materials used in this article

Name	Company	Catalog Number	Comments
Zirconium(IV) chloride, 99.5+%	Alfa Aesar	12104	Air sensitive
Yttium(III) nitrate hexadydrate, 99.9%	Alfa Aesar	12898	Oxidizer
D+ Glucose Anhydrous, ≥99.5%	US Biological Life Sciences	G3050
(±)-Propylene Oxide, ≥99%	Sigma Aldrich	110205	Extremely flammable
Ethanol 200 Proof	Decon Laboratories, Inc.	2716GEA
Argon, 99.997%	Airgas	AR 300	Industrial grade