Detection of water with high sensitivity to study polymer electrolyte fuel cell membranes using cold neutrons at high spatial resolution

Jeffrey R. Bunn, Dayakar Penumadu, Robin Woracek, Nikolay Kardjilov, André Hilger, Ingo Manke, Scott Williams

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

10 Scopus citations

Abstract

Thermal neutron imaging is a powerful non-invasive diagnostic technique to study water management within a proton exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cell. To isolate the hydration behavior of membrane, significant increase in detecting thin water films is needed. A humidity cell is developed to study hydration of a PEM using cold neutron imaging. Spatial and temporal changes of PEM water uptake are quantified. Water film as small as 1 μm thick and corresponding to a volume containing 10 ng of liquid water at high spatial resolution is detected. This represents an order of magnitude improvement in water detection efficiency achievable at thermal neutron imaging facilities.

Original languageEnglish
Article number234102
JournalApplied Physics Letters
Volume102
Issue number23
DOIs
StatePublished - Jun 10 2013
Externally publishedYes

Funding

The authors would like to acknowledge the assistance of both Dr. Jon Owejan and Dr. Thomas Trabold, former lead researchers at General Motors fuel cell laboratory for their assistance in the design and manufacture of the custom RH cell used in the experiments. This material is based upon work partially supported by the U.S. National Science Foundation under Grant No. #0801470 to Dr. D. Penumadu for supporting IGERT student, Mr. Jeffrey R. Bunn.

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