Oxygen takes elitist attitude to sharing electrons

Fuel cells, metal-air batteries, and other devices use electron-exchanging reactions involving gaseous oxygen. To improve these technologies, scientists need to know how the oxygen behaves when it encounters the catalyst, a material that enables the overall reaction. Researchers in California just overturned the conventional thinking about the oxygen's behavior; they showed that the oxygen doesn't exchange electrons with iron and similar metals as once thought. Instead, electron-rich oxygen ions on the catalyst's surface partner with incoming molecular oxygen to break apart the molecule and incorporate the resulting pieces into the catalyst.

Read the whole article on Physorg

More from Physorg