| a | Center for the Condensed-Matter Science and Technology, Department of Physics, Harbin Institute of Technology, Harbin, 150001, PR China |
| b | Heilongjiang Key Laboratory for Low Dimensional System Mesoscopic Physic, School of Physics and Electronic Engineering, Harbin Normal University, Harbin, 150025, PR China |
| c | International Center for Material Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenyang, 110015, PR China |
Received 3 August 2010; revised 19 November 2011; Accepted 22 November 2011. Available online 15 December 2011.
Abstract
In order to develop cathode materials for intermediate temperature solid oxide fuel cell (IT-SOFC), (Ba0.5Sr0.5)1 − xGdxCo0.8Fe0.2O3 − δ (BSGCF: x = 0, 0.02, 0.05, 0.08, and 0.1) oxides were synthesized by sol–gel method. The effects of Gd-doping on the phase structure, thermal expansion coefficient (TEC), thermogravimetric (TG) and the electrical conductivity were investigated. All samples have cubic structure and the lattice shrinks with the increasing content of Gd3 +. The TEC values of BSGCF are in the range of 20.7–22.4 × 10− 6 K− 1 from 50 to 900 °C and the abnormal expansion phenomenon at the temperature range of 300–550 °C is observed in all these samples, which is related with the loss of lattice oxygen as proved by the TG result. The conductivity of BSGCF10 is three times as large as BSCF at 500 °C. While abnormal phenomenon of BSGCF for the x = 0.05 is explained through the critical radius calculation.
