Pt Nanoparticles Densely Coated on SnO2-Covered Multiwalled Carbon Nanotubes with Excellent Electrocatalytic Activity and Stability for Methanol Oxidation

A new electrocatalyst exhibiting enhanced activity and stability is designed from SnO2-covered multiwalled carbon nanotubes coated with 85 wt % ratio Pt nanoparticles (NPs). This catalyst showed a mass activity 6.2 times as active as that of the commercial Pt/C for methanol oxidation, owing to the unique one-dimensional structure. Moreover, the durability and antipoisoning ability were also improved greatly. The enhanced intrinsic performance was ascribed to the densely connected networks of Pt NPs on the SnO2 NPs.