In Situ Detection of Electrochemical Reaction Surface Area by Optical Weak Measurement

Zhangyan Li; Yang Xu; Chongqi Zhou; Jingyu Xi; Yonghong He; Tian Guan; Le Liu

doi:10.1021/acs.analchem.2c02433

In Situ Detection of Electrochemical Reaction Surface Area by Optical Weak Measurement

Anal Chem. 2023 Jan 31;95(4):2176-2182. doi: 10.1021/acs.analchem.2c02433. Epub 2023 Jan 15.

Authors

Zhangyan Li^{1

2

3}, Yang Xu³, Chongqi Zhou^{2

3}, Jingyu Xi¹, Yonghong He^{2

3}, Tian Guan³, Le Liu¹

Affiliations

¹ Institute of Materials Research, Tsinghua Shenzhen International Graduate School, Tsinghua University, Shenzhen 518055, China.
² Department of Physics, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China.
³ Institute of Biopharmaceutical and Health Engineering, Tsinghua Shenzhen International Graduate School, Tsinghua University, Shenzhen 518055, China.

PMID: 36642932
DOI: 10.1021/acs.analchem.2c02433

Abstract

The surface area is key to electrochemical systems, including those in electrocatalysis and energy storage. Studies have shown that the surface area of the electrocatalyst directly affects the electrochemical activity, adsorption performance, and stability of the electrocatalyst. This paper used an optical weak measurement (WM) method, which has little impact on the analyte, to measure the reaction surface area (RSA) that actually participated in the electrochemical reaction. Then compared the RSA obtained by the WM with the total surface area (TSA) obtained by the standard Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) measurement and the active surface area (ASA) obtained by the electrochemical double-layer capacitance (EDLC) method. Their growth trend was consistent, indicating the reliability of the WM method. Compared with the above two methods, the WM method is an in situ detection and easy to operate experimentally, which can help researchers to consider the effect of surface area on electrocatalyst performance more rationally.