No abstract

The coupling of electrochemical processes and surface strain has been widely investigated in the past. The present work briefly introduces a simple method to modulate the electrochemical process at metal surfaces by mechanical bending. In this way, the static strain at the metal layer can reach the order of 1%. The cyclic voltammogram was used to study the electrosorption process of oxygen species at sputtered metal surfaces under different strain states. The experimental results show that the desorption peak potential of oxygen at the Au surface shifted positively by tensile strain, whereas the desorption peak potential at the Pt surface shifted negatively. This phenomenon indicates that tensile strain has an opposite effect on the electrosorption process for Au and Pt surfaces. Our results agree with the previous reports on the potential variation induced by dynamic strain. This work thus offers a simple method to modulate the electrosorption process at metal surfaces and then to enhance the reactivity of metal electrodes.

This study investigates the electrochemical charging and discharging processes at a strained gold surface using dynamic mechanical deformation. The electrocapillary coupling coefficient in our study, , measures the response of the capacitive current to the mechanical elastic strain with a focus on the potential range of the double layer capacitive process of interest. The variation in the magnitude of during the potential scan shows that the impact of surface strain on the capacitive current is strongly dependent on the electrode states. The positive sign of implies that tensile strain can enhance the charging current on the electrode surface, whereas tensile strain has the opposite effect on the discharging current with the potential changing in the negative direction. Moreover, a simple equivalent circuit was used to further characterize the coupling between the capacitive process and mechanical strain at the gold surface for exploring the application in the field of electrochemical energy storage.