Density Functional Theory Study of the Oxygen Reduction Reaction on a Cobalt-Polypyrrole Composite Catalyst

A theoretical study of the oxygen reduction mechanism catalyzed by cobalt-polypyrrole is investigated in detail by means of density functional theory method using the BLYP/DZP basis set. The calculations suggest that the cobalt-polypyrrole has a platinum-like catalytic behavior based on the adsorption energetics of the reaction intermediates. The dicobalt polypyrrole catalyst exhibits a higher catalytic activity than that of mono-cobalt-polypyrrole, due to the fact that the PPy chains in di-cobalt-polypyrrole have a regular structure.