Chemometric Investigation of Platinum Electrodeposition on Titanium Substrates for Ethanol Electro-oxidation

The objective of this work is to employ chemometric tools to investigate the influence of the synthesis parameters in platinum electrodeposition on a titanium substrate using cyclic voltammetry. Through a 2 2 factorial design, using as response the maximum peak current density during the ethanol electro-oxidation, one can observe that the number of cycles and the scan rate are both significant, but the interaction between them is not. The maximum peak current density is observed for the electrode obtained with NC = 20 cycles and SR = 200 mV s −1 . The structural characterization indicates that the surface irregularity of the substrate causes an uneven growth of the (200) and (220) crystallographic planes, which present different performances in the electro-oxidation of ethanol. The response surface methodology indicates that the best experimental condition is that obtained with 10 cycles and 218 mV s −1 . The Pt/Ti electrodes prepared with the optimized parameters are promising. Graphical Abstract A 2 2 factorial design was applied to prepare Pt/Ti for ethanol eletro-oxidation. Pt electrodeposits have shown an atypical “house of cards” morphology. Preferential orientation of Pt on Ti surface are related to better activity. Response surface methodology points 10 cycles at 218 mV s −1 as the best condition.