Electrochemical Behavior of Nanostructured La0.8Sr0.2MnO3 as Cathodes for Solid Oxide Fuel Cells

La0.8Sr0.2MnO3 (LSM) is one of the most commonly used cathodes in Solid Oxide Fuel Cells (SOFC). In spite of the fact that nanostructured cathodes are expected to display improved performance, the high operating temperature (similar to 1000 degrees C) of LSM-based SOFCs hinders their stability. In the present work, we have developed nanostructured cathodes prepared from LSM nanotubes of enhanced performance, allowing its use at lower temperatures (similar to 800 degrees C). We observed that our cathodes have qualitative improvements compared with microstructured materials: firstly, the diffusion in the gas phase is optimized to a negligible level and secondly, evidence of ionic conduction is found, which is extremely rare in LSM cathodes. We propose that this important change in the electrochemical properties is due to the nanostructuration of the cathode and deserves further attention, including the exploration of other materials.